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PRACTICAL AND INTERNAL 
EVIDENCE 

AGAIKST 
WITH 

OCCASIONAL STRICTURES ON MR. BUTLER'S BOOK OP 
THE ROMAN CATHOUC CHURCH: 

IK SIX IiETTZSS, 

ADDRESSED TO THE IMPARTIAL 

AMONG THE 

IXomm eatplf en of ©reat iSvitain $^ Ktf lantr. 



REV. JOSEPH BLANCO WHITE, M.A. B.D. 

if 

In the Umversity of Seville; Licentiate of Divinity in the University 
of Osuna; formerly Chaplain JMa^istral f Preacher J to the King" 
of Spain, in the Royal Chapel at Seville; Fellow, and once Rector^ 
of the College of St. J[Iary a Jesu of the same totun; Synodal Ex" 
arrdner of the Diocess of Cadiz; JMember of the Royal Academy of 
Belles^ LettreSy of Seville, &c. &c.; now a Clergyman of the Church 
of England: — Author o/Doblado's Letters from Spain. 



Ea dicam, quse mihi sunt in promptu; quod ista ipsa de re multum 
».et diu cogitavi. Cicero. 



FIRST AMERICAN EDITXQJfr; 



PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY JAMES C. DUNN, 
1826. 






.t> 



TO THE 

REV. EDWARD COPLESTON, D-D. 

Provost of Oriel College^ Oxford; Prebendary of 
Rochester^ Sfc. Sfc. Sfc. 

MY DEAR SIR, 

You have allowed me to inscribe this work to 
you, and I feel proud thus to associate it with 
your name before the public. 

As the subject, however, on which I have ven- 
tured, is one which violently agitates men's minds 
at this moment, it would be selfish and ungrate- 
ful in me, if, while I enjoyed the benefit of an im- 
plied approbation from an authority so highly and 
so deservedly respected, I were not as anxious to 
save you from misrepresentation, as I am with 
regard to myself. To^conceal that, upon the 
view of part of my manuscript, you have, with 
the greatest kindness, encouraged me to proceed; 
would require a degree of self-denial at which I 
shall never aim. But the hurry in which, from 
the pressure of other literary engagements, I have 
been obliged to prepare the ensuing pages, pre- 



IV 



vented my having the same advantage for the 
whole of the work; and that circumstance mars 
the pleasure which I should have derived from 
your complete sanction. 

Disappointed of that satisfaction, I am happy 
that another is left me in the similarity of our 
Adews, as to what is called the Catholic Question. 
From the friendly intercourse with which you 
have honoured me, I know that you hold it wrong 
to put down religious error by force, or to pro- 
pagate religious truth by degrading and brand- 
ing those who do not think with us. — I have suf- 
fered too much from religious despotism, not ful- 
ly and cordially to hold the same doctrine. The 
fetters which, by God's mercy, I have been ena- 
bled to break, I would rather die than help to ri- 
vet upon a fellow- Christian: but the Power which 
made me groan in protracted bondage, is striving 
to obtain a direct influence in this Government; 
and I cannot regard such efforts with apathy. For 
myself — ^thanks to the generous country which has 
adopted me — I have nothing to fear; but I deem 
it a debt of gratitude to volunteer my testimony 
in the great pending cause, that it may be weigh- 
ed against the studied and ctdoured evidence of 



such writers, as would disguise the true charac- 
ter of the spiritual tyranny, whose fierce grasp 
I have eluded. Indeed I would never have 
shown myself in the field of controversy, but for 
the appearance of a book evidently intended to 
divert the public from the important, and, to me, 
indubitable fact, that sincere Roman Catholics 
cannot conscientiously be tolerant. How far, 
my dear Sir, you are convinced of this, I cannot 
take upon myself to say; but I am sure you will 
allow, that if such be the real character of Ca- 
tholicism, the only security of Toleration must 
be a certain degree of intolerance, in regard to 
its enemies; as prisons in the freest governments 
are necessary for the preservation of freedom. 

I have thus far thought it necessary to touch 
upon the political question with which my work 
is indirectly connected, I say indirectly j because 
the parliamentary question about the claims of 
the Roman Catholics is by no means the object 
which I have had in view while writing. I will 
not deny that I should be glad if my humble per- 
formance could throw any light on a question in 
which the welfare of this country is so deeply con- 
cerned; but it is probable that it will not appear 



VI 



till after the decision of Parliament. Let this, 
however, be as it may, still I humbly hope that, 
whether the Roman Catholics are admitted into 
Parliament, or allowed to continue under the dis- 
abilities which their honest opponents lament, my 
labour will not have been thrown away. For as 
the danger which may threaten this country in 
the admission of Roman Catholic legislators, de- 
pends entirely upon their religious sincerity; I 
shall not have troubled the public in vain if, ei- 
ther I can convince the conscientious of the papal 
communion, that a Roman Catholic cannot ho- 
nestly do his duty as a member of the British 
Parliament without moral guiltj or, what I ar- 
dently wish, my arguments should open theii' 
eyes to the errors of their churcli. 

A work written with these views cannot, I 
trust, however imperfect in the execution, be an 
unworthy testimony of the great respect with 
which I am. 

My dear sir, 
Your most obedient servant, 

JOSEPH BLANCO WHITE. 

Chelsea^ April 30, 1825. 



CONTENTS. 



LETTER I. 

Page 

The Jiuthorh account of himself - - 13 

LETTER IL 

Real and practical extent of the authority of 
the Popcj according to the Roman Catholic 
Faith. Intolerance^ its natural conseqiience^ 4 1 

LETTER IIL 

Examination of the title to infallibility ^ spiri- 
tiial supremacy^ and exclusive salvation^ 
claimed by the Roman Catholic Church. 
Internal evidence against Rome^ in the 2ise 
she has made of her assumed prerogative. 
Short method of determining the question^ 81 

LETTER IV. 

d specimen of the unity exhibited by Rome. 
Roman Catholic distinction between infalli- 
bility in doctrine and liability to misconduct. 
Consequences of this distinction. Roman 
Catholic unity and invariableness of Faithj 
a delusion. Scriptural unity of Faithj 103 



TIU 

LETTER V. 

MorMcharacier of the Roman Church. Celt- 
hacy* Mmneriesj ... 125 

LETTER VL 

Rome the enemy of mental improvement: the 
direct tendency of her Prayer-book^ the Bre- 
viary^ to cherish credulity and adulterate 
Christian virtue^ - ' - - 153 



PRACTICAL AND INTERNAL 
EVIDENCE 



M^^U 



m®mE<&E^Wi 



ETC. 



LETTER L 



The Jliithor^s account of himself. 

If a man be at any time excusable in speaking 
of himself, it must be when he finds it necessary 
to address those to whom he is unknown. The 
name and designation of a writer are, indeed, suf- 
ficient in most cases, and even unnecessary in 
some, for the purposes to which the press is com- 
monly made an instrument; but the occasion of 
this address requires a more intimate acquaintance 
with my personal circumstances. 

Before I proceed, however, I beg you to observe 

ttie word impartial^ by which I have qualified 

Roman Catholics.^^Fvom such RQmaa Catholics 
A 



14* 



as renounce their intellectual rights, and leave the 
trouble of thinking to others, I cannot expect a 
hearing. To the professed champions, in whom 
the mere name of discussion kindles the keen spi- 
rit of controversy, I can say nothing which they 
^re not predetermined to find groundless and fu- 
tile. Among those who, bound to Catholicism by 
the ties of blood and friendship, make consistency 
in religious profession a point of honour, I am 
prepared to meet only with disdain. But there 
must be not a few, in whom the prepossessions of 
education and parentage have failed to smother a 
natural passion for truth, which all the witchery 
of kindred, wealth, and honour, cannot allure from 
its object. To such, among the British and Irish 
Roman Catholics, I direct these letters; for, tho' 
the final result of their religious inquiries may be 
diametrically opposite to that which has separated 
me from my country, my kindred, my honours, 
emoluments, and prospects; I trust that in the fol» 
lowing account of myself they will readily recog- 
nise an intellectual temper, for which no differ- 
ence of opinion can prevent their feeling some 
sympathy. 
I am descended from an Irish family, who^ 



15 



attachment to the Roman Catholic religion was 
often proved by their endurance of the persecu- 
tion which, for a long period, afflicted the mem- 
bers of their persuasion in Ireland. My grand- 
father was the eldest of three brothers, whose vo- 
luntary banishment from their native land, rooted 
out my family from the county of Waterford. A 
considerable fortune enabled my ancestor to set- 
tle at Seville, where he was inscribed on the roll 
of the privileged gentry, and carried on extensive 
business as a merchant. But the love of his na- 
tive land could not be impaired by his foreign re- 
sidence; and as his eldest son (my father) could 
not but grow attached to Spain, by reason of his 
birth, he sent him in his childhood to Ireland, 
that he might also cling to that country by early 
feelings of kindness. It was thus that my father 
combined in his person the two most powerful and 
genuine elements of a religionist — ^the unhesita- 
ting faith of persecuting Spain; the impassioned 
belief of persecuted Ireland. 

My father was the first of his kindred that mar- 
ried into a Spanish family; and his early habits 
of exalted piety made him choose a wife whom 
few can equal in religious sincerity. I have hal- 



16 



loMed the pages of another work^ with the char 
racter of my parents: yet affection would readily 
furnish me with new portraits, were I not anxious 
to get over this preliminary egotism. It is enough 
to say that such were the purity, the benevolence, 
the angelic piety of my father's life, that at hii^ 
death, multitudes of people thronged the house to 
indulge a last view of the dead body. Nor was 
the wife of his bosom at all behind him, either in 
iulness of faith or sanctity of manners. The en- 
deavours of such parents to bring up their chil* 
dren in conformity with their religious notions 
may, therefore, be fully conceived without the 
iielp of description. 

No w aywardness of disposition appeared in me 
to defeat or obstruct their labours. At the age 
of fourteen all the seeds of devotion, which had 
been assidiously sown in my heart, sprung up as 
it were spontaneously. The pious practices, which 
had hitherto been a task, were now the effect of 
my own choice. I became a constant attendant 
at the Congregation of the Oratory, where pious 
young men, intended for the Church, generally 

* Letters from Spain, by Don Leucadio Doblado. 



ly 



had their spiritual directors. Dividing my time 
between study and devotion, I went through a 
course of philosophy and divinity at the Univer- 
sity of Seville; at the end of which I received the 
Roman Catholic order of sub-deacon. By that 
time I had obtained the degrees of Master of xirts 
and Bachelor of Divinity. Being elected a Fel- 
low of the College of St. Mary a Jesu of Seville, 
when I was not of suflScient standing for the su- 
perior degree of Licentiate of DiAinity,^ which 
the Fellowship required, I took that degree at 
Osuna, where the statutes demand no interval be- 
tween these academical honours. A year had 
scarcely elapsed since I had received priest's or- 
ders, when, after a public examination, in com- 
petition with other candidates, I obtained the 
stall of Magistral or Preacher, in the chapter of 
king's chaplains, at Se\ille. Placed, so young, 
in a situation w hich my predecessor had obtained 
after many years' service as a vicar, in the same 

• Previous to the degree of Doctor of Divinity, a severe 
examination takes place, which gives to the Licentiate all the 
rights, though not the honours of Doctorship. These may- 
be obtained by a Licentiate at any time, by the payment of 
some fees. 

A 9 



18 



town, I conceived myself bound to devote my 
whole leisure to the study of religion. I need not 
say that I was fully conversant with the system 
of Catholic Divinity; for I owed my preferment 
to a public display of theological knowledge: yet 
I wished to become acquainted with all kinds of 
works which might increase and perfect that 
knowledge. 

My religious belief had hitherto been undis- 
turbed: but light clouds of doubt began now to 
pass over my mind, w^hich the w armth of devo- 
tion soon dissipated. Yet they would gather 
again and again, with an increased darkness, 
which prayer could scarcely dispel.— That immo- 
rality and levity are always the source of unbe- 
lief, the experience of my ow^n case, and my inti- 
mate acquaintance with many others, enable me 
most positively to deny. As to myself, I declare 
most solemnly that my rejection of Christianity 
took place at a period when my conscience could 
not reproach me with any open breach of duty, 
but those committed several years before: that 
during the transition from religious belief to in- 
credulity, the horror of sins against the faith, 
deeply implanted by education in my soul, haunt- 



19 



ed me night and day; and that I exerted all the 
powers of my mind to counteract the involuntary 
doubts which were daily acquiring an irresistible 
sti'ength. In this distress, I brought to remem- 
brance all the arguments for the truth of the 
Christian religion, which I had studied in the 
French apologists. I read other works of the 
same kind; and having to preach, in the execution 
of my office, to the royal brigade of carabineers, 
who came to worship the body of St. Ferdinand 
preserved in the king's chapel, I chose the subject 
of infidelity, on which I delivered an elaborate 
discourse.^ But the fatal crisis was at hand. — 
At the end of a year, from the preaching of this 
sermon — the confession is painful, indeed, yet due 
to religion itself — I was bo^'dering on atheism. 

If my case were singular, if my knowledge of 
the most enlightened classes of Spain did not fur- 
nish me with a multitude of sudden ti'ansitions 
from sincere faith and piety to the most outrage- 
ous infidelity, I would submit to the humbling 
conviction, that either weakness of judgment or 
fickleness of character, had been the only source 

• This sermon was published at Serille, at the expense 
of the brigade. 



20 



of my errors. But though I am not at liberty to 
mention individual cases, I do attest, from the 
most certain knowledge, that the history of my 
own mind is, with little variation, that of a great 
portion of the Spanish clergy. The fact is cer- 
tain: I make no individual charge: every one who 
comes within this general description may still 
wear the mask, which no Spaniard can throw off 
without bidding an eternal farewell to his country. 

Now, let us pause to examine this moral phe- 
nomenon: and, since I am one of the class which 
exhibits it, I will proceed with the moral dissec- 
tion of myself, however unpleasant the task may- 
be. Many, indeed, will dismiss the case with 
the trite observation that extremes generally pro- 
duce their opposites. But an impartial mind will 
not turn to a common-place evasion, to save it- 
self the labour of thinking. 

When I examine the state of my mind previous 
to my rejecting the Christian faith, I cannot re- 
collect any thing in it but what is in perfect ac- 
cordance with that form of religion in which I 
w^as educated. I revered the Scriptures as the 
w ord of God; hut was also persuaded that without 
a living-^ infallible interpreter, the Bible was a 



SI 



dead letter, which could not convey its meaning 
with any certainty. I grounded, therefore, my 
Christian faith upon the infallibility of the church. 
No Roman Catholic pretends to a better founda- 
tion. ^^I believe whatever the holy mother church 
holds and believes/' is the compendious creed of 
every member of the Roman communion. Had my 
donbts affected any particular doctrine, I should 
have clung to the decisions of a church which 
claims exemption from error; but my first doubts 
attacked the very basis of Catholicism. I believe 
that the reasoning which shook my faith is not 
new in the vast field of theological controversy. 
But I protest that, if such be the case, the coinci- 
dence adds weight to the argument, for I am per- 
fectly certain that it was the spontaneous sugges- 
tion of my own mind. I thought within myself 
that the certainty of the Roman Catholic faith had 
no better ground than a fallacy of that kind which 
is called reasoning in a circle; for I believed the 
infallibility of the church because the Scripture 
said she was infallible; while I had no better proof 
tliat the Scripture said so, than the assertion of 
the church, that she could not mistake the Scrip- 
ture, la vain did 1 endeavour to evade the force 



3® 



of this argument; indeed I still believe it unan- 
swerable. Was, then, Cliristianity nothing but 
a groundless fabric, the world supported by the 
elephant, the elephant standing on the tortoise? 
Such was the conclusion to which I was led by a 
system which impresses the mind with the obscu- 
rity and insufficiency of the written word of Grod. 
Why should I consult the Scriptures? My only 
choice was between revelation explained by the 
ehurch of Rome, and no revelation. Catholics 
tvlio live in Protestant countries may, in spite of 
the direct tendency of their system, practically 
perceive the unreal nature of this dilemma. But 
wherever the religion of Rome reigns absolute, 
there is but one step between it and infidelity. 

To describe the state of my feelings, when, be- 
lieving religion a fable, I still found myself com- 
pelled daily to act as a minister and promoter of 
imposture, is certainly beyond my powers. An 
ardent wish seized me to fly from a country where 
the law left me no choice between death and hy- 
pocrisy. But my flight would have brought my 
parents with sorrow to the grave; and I thank 
God that he gave me a heart which, though long 
^^vithoutlaw,'' was often, as in this case, a ^^law^ 



ds 



to myself.'* Ten years, the best of my life, wei»e 
passed in this insufferable state, when the approach 
of Buonaparte^s troops to Seville enabled me to 
quit Spain, without exciting suspicion as to the 
real motive which tore me for ever from every 
thing I loved. I was too well aware of the firm- 
ness of my resolutions, not to endure the most 
agonizing pain when I irrevocably crossed the 
threshold of my father's house, and when his 
bending figure disappeared from my eyes, at the 
first winding of the Guadalquivir, down which I 
sailed. Heaven knows that time has not had 
power to heal the wounds which this separation 
inflicted on my heart; but, such was the misery 
of my mental slavery, that not a shadow of regret 
for my determination to expatriate myself, has 
ever exasperated the evils inseparable from the 
violent step by which I obtained my freedom. 

Having described the fatal effects of Catholicisna 
on my mind, I will, with equal candour, relate 
the changes operated upon it, by my residence in 
England. 

It was the general opinion in Spain, that Pro- 
testants, though often adorned with moral vir- 
tues, were totally deficient in true religious foel- 



24 

ings. This was the opinion of Spanish Catho- 
lics. Spanish unhelievers, like myself, were 
most firmly convinced that men, enlightened as 
the English, could only regard religion as a po- 
litical engine. Our greater acquaintance with 
French books, and with Frenchmen, strongly 
supported us in the idea that belief in Christiani- 
ty decreased in proportion to the progress of 
knowledge, in every part of the w orld. As to 
myself, I declare that I did not expect to find a 
sincere Christian among educated Englishmen. 
Providence, however, so directed events, that 
some of my first acquaintance in London were 
persons whose piety was adorned with every good 
quality of the heart and mind. It was among 
these excellent friends, and under the protection 
of British liberty, that the soreness and irritation 
produced by ten years' endurance of the most 

watchful religious tyranny, began to subside 

I was too much ashamed of being supposed a Ro- 
man Catholic, to disguise the character of my re- 
ligious opinions^ but the mildness and toleration 
\Aith which my sentiments were received, made 
me perceive, for the first time, that a Christian 15 
noi necessarily a bigot. The mere throwing away 



25 

the hated mask which the Inquisition had forced 
me to wear, refreshed my soul: and the excellent 
man to whom, for the first time in my life, I ac- 
knowledged my unbelief without fear, was able 
to perceive that I might yet be a Christian, pro- 
vided I saw religion divested of all force but that 
of persuasion* 

An accident (if any thing which leads to results 
so important, can be so called,) made me, in an 
idle moment, look into Paley's Natural Theology, 
wliich lay upon a table. I was struck by the 
author's peculiar manner and style: I borrowed 
the book, and read it with great interest. Feel« 
ings of piety towards the great author of Nature 
began to thaw the unnatural frost which misery, 
inflicted in his name, had produced in a heart not 
formed to be ungrateful. It was in this state of 
mind that, being desirous of seeing every thing 
worthy of observation in England, I went one 
Sunday to St. James's church. A foreigner, ig- 
norant of the language, w ould have brought away 
nothing but an unpleasant recollection of the 
length of the service; but I had learnt English 
in my childhood, and could understand it, at this 

time, without difficulty. The prayers, though 
B 



^v 



S6 



containing what I did not believe, appeared to 
me solemn and affecting. I had not for many 
years entered a church without feelings of irrita- 
tion and hostility, arising from'' the ideas of op- 
pressive tyranny which it called up in my mind; 
but here was nothing that could check sympathy, 
or smother the reviving sentiments of natural re- 
ligion, which Paley had awakened. It happened 
tliat, before the sermon, was given Addison's 
beautiful hymn, 

When all thy mercies, O my God 1 

My rising soul surveys, 
Transported with the view, I'm lost 

In wonder, love and praise. 

At the end of the second verse, my eyes werr 
streaming with tears; and I believe that from 
that day, I never passed one without some ardent 
aspirations towards the author of my life and ex- 

istence. 

This was all the change that for a year or more, 
took place in my religious notions. Obliged to 
support myself chiefly by my pen, and anxious at 
the same time to acquire some branches of learn- 
ing which Spanish education neglects, my days 



27 



and nights were employed in study: yet religion 
had daily some share of my attention. I learnt 
that the author of the Natural Theology had also 
written a work on the Evidences of Christianity, 
and curiosity lead me to read it. His arguments 
appeared to me very strong; hut I found an in- 
trinsic incredibility in the facts of revealed his- 
tory, which no general evidence seemed able to 
remove. I was indeed labouring under what I 
believe to be a very common error in this matter — 
an error which I have not been able completely to 
correct, without a very long study of the subject 
and myself. I expected that general evidence 
would remove the natural inverisimilitude of mi- 
raculous events: that, being convinced by unan- 
swerable arguments that Christ and his disciples 
could be neither impostors nor enthusiasts, and 
that the narrative of their ministry is genuine 
and true, the imagination would not shrink from 
forms of things so dissimilar to its own represen- 
tations of real objects, and so conformable in ap- 
pearance with the tricks of jugglers and impos- 
tors. Now the fact is, that probable and likely ^ 
though used as synonimous in common language, 
are perfectly distinct in philosophy. The prjoba- 



28 



ble is that for the reality of which we can allege 
some reason: the likebj^ that which bears in its 
face a semblance or analogy to what is classed in 
our minds under the predicament of existence.* 
This association is made early in life, among 
Christians, in favour of the miraculous events 
recorded in the Holy Scriptures^ and, if not bro- 
ken by infidelity in after-life, the study of the Gos- 
pel evidence gives those events a character of 
reality which leaves the mind satisfied and at rest; 
because it finds the history of revealed religion 
not only probablej but likeltj. It is much other- 
wise with a man** who rejects the Gospel for a 
considerable period, and accustoms his mind to 
rank the supernatural works recorded by Reve- 
lation, with falsehood and imposture. Likeli- 



* Likely is the adjective of the phrase like the truth, simile 
"vero. It is strange that the English language should not 
possess a substantive answering to le vraiaemblable of the 
French. The use of improbable to denote what in that lan- 
guage is meant by invraisemblable, is incorrect. When the 
French critics reject some indubitable historical facts from 
the stage, because they want vraisemblance (likelihood), they 
do not mean to say that they are improbable, or deficient in 
proofs of their reality; but that the imagination finds them 
unlike to what in the common opinion is held to be the usual 
course of events. 



29 



hoodj in this case, becomes the strongest gFOund 
of unbelief; and probability, though it may con- 
vince the understanding, has but little influence 
over the imagination. 

A sceptic who yields to the powerful proofs of 
Revelation, will, for a long time, experience a 
most painful discordance between his judgment 
and the associations which unbelief has produc- 
ed. When most earnest in the contemplation of 
Christian truth, when endeavouring to bring 
liome its comforts to the heart, the imagination 
will suddenly revolt, and cast the whole, at a 
^weep, among the rejected notions. This is, in- 
deed, a natural consequence of infidelity^, which 
mere reasoning is not able to remove. Nothing 
but humble prayer can, indeed, obtain that faith 
which, wlien reason and sound judgment have led 
us to supernatural truth, gives to unseen things 
the body and substance of reality. But of this I 
shall have occasion to speak again. 

The degree of conviction produced by Paley^s 
Evidences was, however, sufficiently powerful to 
make me pray daily for divine assistance. This 
was done in a very simple manner. Every morn- 
ing I repeated the Lord's Prayer seriously an# 
B 3 



30 



attentively, offering up to my Maker a sincere 
desire of the true knowledge of him. This prac- 
tice I continued three years; my persuasion that 
Christianity was not one and the same thing with 
the Roman Catholic religion, growing stronger 
all the while. As my rejection of revealed reli- 
gion had heen the effect^ not of direct objection to 
its evidences, but of weighing tenets against them, 
which they were not intended to support; the ba- 
lance inclined in favour of the truth of the Gos- 
pel, in proportion as I struck out dogmas, which 
I had been taught to identify with the docti'ines 
of Christ. =^ The day arrived, at length, when 
convinced of the substantial truth of Christianity^ 



* Paley, with his usual penetration, has pointed out this 
most important result of the Reformation: "When the doc- 
trine of Transubstantiation (he says in his address to Dr. Law, 
Bishop of Carlisle, prefixed to the Principles of Moral Phi- 
losophy) had taken possession of the Christian world, it was 
not without the industry of learned men that it came at 
length to be discovered that no such doctrine was contained 
in the New Testament. But had those excellent persons 
done nothing more hy their discovery than abolished an in- 
nocent superstition, or changed some directions in the cere- 
monial of public worship, they had merited little of that ve- 
neration with which the gratitude of Protestant churches 
remembers their services. What they did for mankind was 
this-^Mey exonerated Chmtianity of a -weight that sunk iti^ 



u 



no question remained before me, but that of choo* 
sing the form under which I was to profess it.— 
The deliberation which preceded this choice was 
one of no great difficulty to me. The points of 
difference between the church of England and 
Rome, though important^ are comparatively few: 
they were, besides, the very points which had 
produced my general unbelief. That the doc- 
trines common to both churches were found in the 
Scriptures, my early studies and professional 
knowledge, left me no room to doubtj and as the 
Evidences of Revelation had brought me to ack« 
nowledge the authority of the Scriptures, I could 
find no objection to the resumption of tenets which 
had so long possessed my belief. The communion 
in which I was inclined to procure admission was 
not, indeed, that in which I was educated^ but I 
had so long wandered away from the Roman fold^ 
that, when approaching the church of England, 
both the absence of what had driven me from Ca- 
tholicism, and the existence of all the other parts 
of that system, made me feel as if I were return^ 
ing to the repaired home of my youth. 

Upon receiving the sacrament for the first time 
according to the form of the English churchy 



33 



my early feelings of devotion rcvivctl; yet by no 
means, as it might be feared in a common case, 
with some secret leaning to what I had left; for 
Catholicism was thoroughly blended with my 
bitterest recollections. It w as a devotion more 
calm and more rational; if not quite strong in 
faith, yet decided as to practice. The religious 
act I performed I considered as a most solemn 
engagement to obey the laws of the Gospel; and 
I thank God, that since that period, whatever 
clouds have obscured my religious views, no de- 
liberate breach of the sacred law, has increased 
the sting of remorse which the unbelieving part 
of my life left in my breast. 

The renovated influence of religion, cherished 
by meditation and study, induced me, after a period 
of a year and a half, to resume my priestly cha- 
racter; a step without which I thought I had not 
completed the re-acknowledgment I owed to the 
truth of Christianity. If any one unacquainted 
with my circumstances should be inclined to sus- 
pect my motives, he may easily ascertain his mis- 
take, by inquiring into the uniform tenour of my 
conduct since, in 18i4, 1 subscribed the ai'ticles of 
the chiu'ch of Englandi 



33 



Having now done what I conceived to be a 
public duty, I retired to Oxford, not to procure 
admission into the university, which my age 
would have rendered preposterous; but to live 
privately in that great seat of learning, devoting 
my time exclusively to the study of the Scriptures. 
I had resided a year in that place, when an En- 
glish nobleman, who since he knew me in Spain 
has ever honoured me with his friendvship, gave 
me the highest proof of esteem by inviting me to 
become tutor to his son. I accepted the charge^, 
though with fears that the declining state of my 
health would greatly disqualify me for the im- 
portant duties to which I was called; and which I 
discharged for two years to the best of my power, 
till my grow ing infirmities compelled me to resign. 

Neither the duties of the tutorsliip, nor the con- 
tinual sufferings which I have endured ever since, 
could damp my eagerness in the search of religious 
truth. Shall I be suspected of cant in this de- 
claration? Alas! let the confession which I am 
going to make, be the unquestionable, though me- 
lancholy proof of my sincerity. 

For more than three years my studies in divinity 
were to me a source of increasing attachment to 



3* 



Christian faith and practice. When I quitted my 
charge as tutor, I had begun a series of short 
lectures on religion, the first part of which I de- 
livered to the young members of the family. =^ 
Having retired to private lodgings in London, it 
was my intention to prosecute that work for the 
benefit of young persons; but there was by this 
time a mental phenomenon ready to appear in me, 
to which I cannot now look back without a strong 
sense of my own weakness. My vehement desire 
of knowledge not allowing me to neglect any op- 
portunity of reading whatever books on divinity 
came to my hands, I studied the small work on the 
Atonement, by Taylor of Norwich. The confirm- 
ed habits of my mind were too much in accordance 
with every thing that promised to remo\e mystery 
from Christianity, and I adopted Taylor's views 
without in the least suspecting the consequences. 
It was not long, however, before I found myself 
beset with great doubts on the divinity of Christ. 
My state became now exceedingly painful; for, 
though greatly wanting religious comfort in the 

* These Lectures were published at Oxford, in 18ir, with 
the title of Preparatory Observations on the Study 
or Rbli&ion, by a CLEitoTMly ofthil chubch of Enolafd. 



35 



solitude of a sick room, where I was a prey to paiu 
and extreme weakness, I perceived that religious 
practices had lost their power of soothing me. 
But no danger or suffering has, in the course of 
my life, deterred me from the pursuit of truth. 
Having now suspected that it might be found in 
the Unitarian system, I boldly set out upon the 
search; but there I did not find it. AVhatever in- 
dustry and attention could do, all was performed 
with candour and earnestness; but, in length of 
time, Christianity, in the light of Unitarianism, 
appeared to me a mighty work to little purpose: 
and I lost all hope of quieting my mind. With 
doubts unsatisfied wherever I turned, I found my- 
self rapidly sliding into the gulf of Scepticism: but 
it pleased God to prevent my complete relapse. 
I knew too well the map of infidelitj^ to be deluded 
a second time by the hope of finding a resting- 
place to the sole of my foot, throughout its wide 
domains: and now I took and kept a determination 
to give my mind some rest from the studies, which, 
owing to my peculiar circumstances, had evidently 
occasioned the moral fever under which I labour- 
ed. What was the real state of my faith in this 
period of darkness, God alone can judge. This 



36 



only can I state with confidence, — ^that I prayed 
daily for light; that I invariably considered my- 
self bound to obey the precepts of the Gospel; and 
that, when harassed with fresh doubts, and tempt- 
ed to turn away from Christ, I often repeated from 
my heart the affecting exclamation of the apostle 
Peter — ^Ho whom shall I go? thou hast the words 
of eternal life." 

For some time I thought it an act of criminal 
insincerity to approach, with these doubts, the 
sacramental table; but the consciousness that it 
was not in my power to alter my state of mind, 
and that, if death, as it appeared very probable, 
should overtake me as I was, I could only throw 
myself with all my doubts upon the mercy of my 
Maker! induced me to do the same in the per- 
formance of the most solemn act of religion. But 
I had not often to undergo this awi'ul trial. Ob- 
jections which, during this struggle, had appeared 
to me unanswerable, began gradually to lose their 
weight on my mind. The Christian Evidences 
which, at the period of my change from infidelity, 
struck me as powerful in detail^ now presenting 
themselves collectively ^ acquired a strength which 
no detached difficulties (and all the arguments of 



37 

infidelity are so) could shake. '^^^ My mind, in 
fact, found rest in that kind of conviction which 
belongs peculiarly to moral subjects, and seems 
to depend on an intuitive perception of the truth 
through broken clouds of doubt, which it is not 
in the power of mortal man completely to dispeL 
Let no one suppose that I allude to either mys- 
terious or enthusiastic feelings; I speak of con- 
viction arising from examination. But any man, 
accustomed to observe the workings of the mind, 
will agree, that conviction, in intricate moral 
questions, comes finally in the shape of internal 
£eelmg—2i perception perfectly distinct from syllo- 
gistic conviction, but which exerts the strongest 
power over our moral nature. Such perception of 
the truth is, indeed, the spring of our most im- 
portant actions, the common bond of social life, 
the ground of retributive justice, the parent of all 
human laws. Yet, it is inseparable from more or 

* I believe it a duty to mention a work which, under Provi- 
dence, contributed to put an end to my trial, I mean the In- 
ternal Evidences of ChHstianity, by the Rev. John Bird Sum- 
ner;— a book which I would strongly recommend to every 
candid inquirer into religious truth, as containing one of the 
most luminous views, not only of the proofs, but the doctrines 
of the Gospel, which it was ever xny good fortune to peruse- 
C 



38 



less doubt; for doubtless conviction is only to be 
found about objects of sense, or those abstract 
citations of the mind, pure number and dimen- 
sion, which employ the ingenuity of mathemati- 
cians. That assurance respecting things not 
seen, which the Scriptures call Faithy is a super- 
natural gift, which reasoning can never produce. 
This difference between the conviction resulting 
from the examination of the Christian Evidences, 
and Faithf in the Scriptural sense of the word, 
appears to me of vital importance, and much to 
be attended to by such as, having renounced the 
Gospel, are yet disposed to give a candid hear- 
ing to its advocates. The pow er of tlie Christian 
Evidences, is that of leading any considerate 
mind, unobstructed by prejudice, to the records 
of Revelation, and making it ready to derive in- 
struction from that source of supernatural truth; 
but it is the Spirit of truth alone, that can impart 
the internal conviction of Faith. 

I have now gone through the religious history 
of my mind, in which I request you to notice the 
result of my various situations. Under the in- 
fluence of that mental despotism, which would 
, prevent investigation by the fear of eternal ruin, 



3B 



or which mocks reason by granting the examina- 
tion of premises, while it reserves to itself the 
riglit of drawing conclusions; I was irresistibly 
urged into a denial of Revelation: but no sooner 
did I obtain freedom than, instead of my mind 
running riot in the enjoyment of the long-delayed 
boon, it opened to conviction, and acknowledged 
tlie truth of Christianity. The temper of that 
mind shows, I believe, the general character of 
the age to which it belongs- I have been enabled 
to make an estimate of the moral and intellectual 
state of Spain, which few who know me and that 
country, will, I trust, be inclined to discredit. 
Upon the strength of this knowledge, I declare 
again and again that very few among my own 
class (I comprehend clergy and laity) think other- 
wise than I did before my removal to England. 
The testimony of all who frequent the Continent — 
a testimony which every one's knowledge of fo- 
reigners supports — ^represents all Catholic coun- 
tries in a similar condition. Will it, then, be 
unreasonable to suppose, that if a fair choice was 
given between the religion of Rome and other 
forms of Christianity, many would, like myself, 
embrace the Gospel which they have rejected? 



40 



Is there not some pi*esuniption of error against a 
system which every where revolts an improving 
age from Christianity ? Let us examine that sys- 
tem itself. 



LETTER IL 

Real and practical extent of the Jtuthority of the 
PopCj according to the Roman Catholic Faith* 
Intolerance^ its natural consequence. 

Were I addressing Catholics, who live under 
the full and unchecked influence of the church of 
Rome, it would be unnecessary to come to a pre- 
vious understanding of the true nature of their 
tenets; for even persons who have never looked 
into a theological treatise, are fully aware, in 
such countri^es, of the difference between some dis- 
puted points, and the doctrines which their church 
holds as immutable articles of faith. The case 
is, I perceive, much otherwise in England. — 
From the attention which I have of late given to 
the books which issue out of the English Roman 
Catholic press, I am convinced that there exist 
two kindsof writers of your persuasion; one, who 
WTite for the Protestant public, and for such 
among yourselves as cannot well digest the real 

unsophisticated system of their Roman head; the 
C 2 



42 



otter, for the mass of their Britisli and Irisli 
church, who still adhere to the Roman Catholic 
system, such as it is professed in countries where 
all other religions are condemned by law. In 
your devotional books, and in such works as are 
intended to keep up the warmth of attachment to 
your religious party, I recognise every feature of 
the religion in which I was educated; in those in- 
tended for the public at large, I only find a flat- 
tered and almost ideal portrait of those to me 
well-known features, which, unchanged and un- 
softened by age, the writers are conscious, can- 
not be seen without disgust by any of those to 
whom custom has not made them familiar. 

The most artful picture of this kind which has 
come to my hands, is the Book of the Roman Ca- 
tholic Churchy by Charles Butler, Esquire, of 
Lincoln's Inn. The high character which the 
author bears for learning and probity makes me 
desirous to avoid even the shadow of a charge im- 
plying any thing derogatory to those qualities; 
but I cannot hesitate to declare that his statement 
of the Roman Catholic doctrines, since it must be 
believed to have been drawn with sincerity, pre- 
sents a straiige instance of the power of prejudice 



48 



in distorting the clearest objects. In another 
part of this book^ you will find a striking proof 
that the vehemence of his party spirit goes even 
to impair his knowledge of the Latin language, 
and makes a man, whom report classes among 
your best scholars, render a passage into En- 
glish, in a manner so far from giving the mean- 
ing of the original, that it contradicts itself in the 
translation. 

Had such inaccuracies affected only points of 
secondary importance, or related exclusively to 
the many historical facts to which Mr. Butler's 
book refers, I would leave them to more learned 
and experienced critics; but as he has besides, 
given an incorrect view^ of your most essential 
duties as Catholics; I must beg your attention to 
some remarks on that part of his book which 
treats of the authority of the Pope. He that, 
fully aware of the nature of his engagements to 
the Church of Rome, is still determined to obey 
her, should not be disturbed in the use of his dis- 
cretion; but varnished accounts of religious sys- 
tems must not be allowed to rivet religious preju- 
dice, or stand as a lure to the unwary. 
• See Note A, 



44 



The book of the Roman Catholic Church labours 
to persuade the world that the authority of the 
Pope over the Catholics is of so spiritual a na- 
ture, as, if strictly reduced to what the creed of 
that church requires, can never interfere with the 
civil duties of those who own that authority. — 
That the supreme head of the Catholics has, for 
a long series of centuries, actually claimed a 
paramount obedience, and thus actually interfer- 
ed with the civil allegiance of his spiritual sub- 
jects; is as notorious as the existence of the Ro- 
man See. The question then, is, whether this 
was a mere abuse, the effect of human passion!^ 
encouraged by the ignorance of those ages, or a 
fair consequence of doctrines held by the Roman 
church as of divine origin, and consequently im- 
mutable. I will proceed in this inquiry upon 
Mr. Butler's own statement of the Roman Catho- 
lic articles of faith, which is found p. 118 of the 
first edition of his work. 

*^A chain of Roman Catholic writers on papal 
power might be supposed: on the first link we 
might place the Roman Catholic writers who have 
immoderately exalted the prerogative of the Pope; 
on the last we might place the Roman Catholic 



r 



45 



wTiters^ who have unduly depressed itj and the 
centre link might be considered to represent the 
canon of the 10th session of the council of Florence, 
which defined that ^full power was delegated to 
the bishop of Rome in the person of St Peter, to 
feed, regulate and govern the universal church, 
as expressed in the general councils and holy 
canons.' This (adds the author, in capitals) is 
the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church 
ON THE authority OF THE POPE, and bcyond it 
no Roman Catholic is required to believe/' 

When I examine the vague comprehensiveness 
of this decree, I can hardly conceive what else the 
Roman Catholics could be required to believe. 
Full power to feed J regulate and govern the uni- 
versal churchy can convey to the mind of the 
sincere Catholic no idea of limitation. Whatever 
be the extent of the chain imagined by our author, 
the decree appears to have been framed wide 
enough not to exclude the link containing the wvi- 
ters who have most exalted the papal power. The 
task of those on the other extremity of the chain, 
is certainly more difficulty for it cannot well be 
conceived why mere human rights should be 
ano\\'ed to limit a/wM power to govern the minds 



46 



of men, derived from a direct injunction of Christ. 
Let this be, however, as it may, one thing is cer- 
tain, that a true Catholic may understand the /w!i 
Tpower of feedings regulating and governing the 
universal church according to either the Trans- 
alpine or Cisalpine explanation of the doctrine 
declared by the council of Florence. He may 
consequently believe, that the Pope has, <*atthe 
least, an indirect temporal power for effecting a. 
spiritual good in any kingdom to which the uni- 
versal church extends;'' and ^Hhat every state is 
so far subject to the Pope, that when he deems 
that the bad conduct of the sovereign renders iti 
essential to the good of the church that he shall I 
reign no longer, the Pope is authorised by his 
divine commission to deprive him of his sovereign- 
ty, and absolve his subjects from their obligation 
of allegiance.*'^ A Catholic may, on the other 
hand, with the divines of the Gallican church,, 
deny to the Pope this power of deposing princes.. 
Of these two explanations of the infallible doctrine? 
on the Pope's supremacy, Mr. Butler says, thatt 
* ^neither speaks the church's faith." This is, in- 

* Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p. 121. 



47 



deed, a remarkable fact. It is a fact from which 
we may infer, either that the Pope and his church 
do not understand the meaning of the inspiration 
on which they build the claim to infallibility, or 
that they receive that inspiration under a kind of 
political cipher, which, though laid before the 
eyes of the world, still leaves us in perfect ob- 
scurity as to its contents. Can any one doubt 
that the Pope, in the face of Christendom, issued 
a sentence of deposition against Queen Elizabeth? 
Had not a similar practice prevailed for many 
centuries before? Was this not done by virtue of 
what Popes conceived to be their divine preroga- 
tive, declared in the council of Florence? Did 
not tlie greatest part of the Catholic bishops allow, 
by their tacit or express consent, that the head of 
their church was acting in conformity with the 
inspired definition of his power? Were I not too 
well acquainted with the extreme flexibility, the 
deluding slipperiness of Roman Catholic theology^ 
I should contend that the sense of the council of 
Florence had, on these occasions, been fixed by 
infallible authority; for the Pope ^^may promul- 
gate definitions and formularies of faith to the 
universal church, and when the general body, or 



48 



a great majority of her prelates have assented to 
them, either by formal consent or tacit consent^ all 
are bound to acquiesce in them/'=^ But alas for 
those Avho will not be convinced! The bulls of 
deposition, though always prefaced by a declara- 
tion of doctrine concerning the power of the Ro- 
man see^ though issued with all possible solemni- 
ty; though assented to by all the bishops, except, 
perhaps, a few among the subjects of the monarch 
so deposed and condemned — these bulls will be. 
found not to be definitions and formularies of 
faith. They express a doctrine tolerated in the 
church of Rome, but not her faith: ^^this (says 
Mr. Butler) is contained in the canon of the coun- 
cil of Florence. Ml the doctrine of that canon an 
the point in question^ and nothing but that doctrine, 
is propounded by the Roman Catholic church to 
be believed by the faithful. '^f But will Mr. But- 
ler tell us how the faithful are to ascertain what 
it is this ALL contains? No, he certainly cannot. 
His church tolerates the opinion which in this 
ALL, comprehends the authority to depose princesj 
nay, the Popes have acted according to that opi- 

* Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p. 120, Isted. 
t Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p. 124, Isted. 



49 



nion, till the consolidation of the European powers 
tied their hands; but she also tolerates (the word 
is here in its place) the opinion of those who strike 
off from that all, no less a part than the Pope's 
supremacy over the sovereigns of the earth. 

Little indeed has the inspiration of the Floren- 
tine fathers done for you, who, sincerely attached 
to the Roman Catholic church, are desirous to 
perform all your duty to its head. You might 
indeed, have expected that, former Popes having 
unfortunately increased the obscurity of this im- 
portant point of your faith by their political claims, 
those who have filled the Roman see in later 
times would have put an end to these doubts, by 
tolerating no longer, but publicly and positively 
disclaiming, the doctrines of supremacy embraced 
by their predecessors. Instead of allowing the 
English and Irish Catholics to apply to Catholic 
universities for declarations, which these bodies 
are not authorised to give, the Pope himself might 
at once have removed the doubt, as ta the obe- 
dience which he claims from you. Why, then, this 
silence? why this toleration of soi opinion which 
casts a suspicion upon your loyality; which if 

adopted, as you certainly may adopt it so long as 
D 



50 



it is tolerated^ must more than divide your alle- 
giance? I think I can explain the cause of this 
conduct. 

If either of the two systems concerning the 
authority of the Pope were considered hy the 
Roman Catholic church as absolutely false, she 
could not tolerate it consistently with her claims 
to infallibility: she must therefore believe them 
both partially true. This, however, could not take 
place if she understood the council of Florence 
(as Mr. Butler contends) in a sense equally dis- 
tant from the two extreme theological opinions. 
If both express partially her own sense, that 
sense must be broad enough to embrace a sub- 
stantial part of the two; and such is really the 
case. The Transalpine^ divines regard the grant 
supposed to have been made by Christ to the Pope, 
abstractedly from the external circumstances of 

* Transalpine and Cisalpine are used here in a very un- 
classical sense; but as these denominations prevail among* Ro- 
man Catholic divines, I am in a certain degree compeUed to 
use them. If the reader imagines himself in France, where 
they were first used, the mistake into which they are apt to 
lead, will easily be avoided. Transalpine writers are those 
who scarcely set any bounds to the authority of the Pope; 
Cisalpine those who, with Bossuetj contend for the privileges 
of the Galilean church. 



51 



the Roman church,- and, considering that he who 
h2iS full authority to feed the flock, must also have 
it to preserve the pasturage safe and unobstruct- 
ed, assert that the deposition of a heretical prince 
falls within the divine prerogative of the head of 
the Roman Catholics. The Cisalpine writers, on 
the other hand, perceiving that the assertion of 
this doctrine, and any attempt to put it into prac- 
tice, would defeat the object of the Pope's autho- 
rity, by raising political opposition to the chu^chj 
deny that such a specific power against secular 
princes, was ever intended by Christ. The Ro- 
man see allows these two opinions to be held, be- 
cause, as it believes that the Pope's power, to be 
full^ must extend to every act which circumstan- 
ces may make advantageous to the church; it will 
not restrain his hands in any possible emergency 
from checking political opposition to the prospe- 
rity of the Roman Catholic religion. But as it 
inatj be true that under the circumstances of the 
civilized world, it will never be expedient to call 
upon Catholics to refuse theii' allegiance to an 
enemy of the Roman Catholic church, the Cisal^ 
pine opinions, which at first were strongly oppo- 
sed by Rome, are at present tolerated. 



92 



I have hitherto examined the Roman Catholic 
iloctrine concerning the Pope's supremacy, not 
because I conceive it to have any practical effect 
in this country, but in order to expose the vague- 
ness, obscurity, and doubt in which the declara- 
tion of one of your infallible councils — a declara- 
tion, too, relating to so important a subject as the 
divi7ie power of your spiritual head — is involved. 
The days, however, are no more when the Pope, 
in virtue of his full power to feed^ regulatej and 
govern youy might endeavour to remove a Protest- 
ant king from the throne. The trial to which, as 
JBritish subjects and Roman Catholics, you are 
3till exposed, is perfectly unconnected with the 
temporal claims of your . ecclesiastical head; it 
flows directly from the spiritual. Hence the con- 
stant efforts of your political advocates to fix the 
attention of the public on the question of temporal 
supremacy, in which they make a show of inde- 
pendence. Hence the irrelevant questions pro- 
posed to the Catholic universities, which, as their 
object was known, gave ample scope to the ver- 
satile casuistry of those bodies. Their task, in 
assisting their brethren of England and Ireland, 
would have certainly required a greater degree 



53 



of ingenuity, had the following question been sub- 
stituted for the three which were actually pro- 
posed: — Can the Pope^ in virtue of what Roman 
Catholics believe his divine aitthorittfy command 
the assistance of the faithful in checking the pro- 
gress of heresy^ by any means not likely to produce 
loss or danger to the Roman Catholic church; and 
can that church acknmvledge the validity of any 
engagement to disobey the Pope in such cases? 
This is a question of great practical importance 
to all sincere Catholics in these kingdoms. Al- 
low me, therefore, to canvass it according to the 
settled principles of your faith and practice, since 
political views prevent your own winters from 
placing it in its true light. 

At the time when I am writing this, one branch 
of the legislature has declared itself favourable to 
what is called Catholic emancipation^ and, for 
any thing I can conjecture, Roman Catholics may 
be allowed to sit in parliament before these Let- 
ters appear in public A Roman Catholic legis- 
lator of Protestant England would, indeed, feel 
the weight of the dijEculty to which my suggested 
question alludes, provided his attachment to the 

Roman Catholic faith were sincere. A real Ro* 
D £ 



54 



uian Catholic once filled the throne of these 
realms, under similar circumstances^ and neither 
the strong bias which a crown at stake must have 
given to his mind, nor all the ingenious evasions 
proposed to him by the ablest divine of the court 
of Louis XIV. could remove or disguise the ob- 
stacles which his faith opposed to his political 
duties. The source of the religious scruples 
which deprived James II. of his regal dignity, is 
expressed in one of the questions which he pro- 
posed to several divines of his persuasion. It 
comprises, in a few words, what every candid 
mind must perceive to be the true and only diffi- 
culty in the admission of Roman Catholics to the 
parliament of these kingdoms. What James 
doubted respecting the regal sanction, a member 
of either house may apply to the more limited in- 
fluence of his vote. He asked ^^ Whether the 
king could promise to give his assent to all the 
laws which might be proposed for the greater se- 
curity of the church of England ?'* Four English 
divines, who attended James in his exile, answer- 
ed without hesitation in the negative. The casu- 
istry of the French court was certainly less ab- 
rupt. Loui« XIV. observed to Jamesi^ that ^^a$ 



55 



'the exercise of the Catholic religion could not he re- 
established in Englandj save by removing from the 
people the impression that the king was resolved 
to make it triumph^ he must dissuade him from 
saying or doing any thing which might authorise 
or augment this fearJ^ The powerful talents of 
Bossuet were engaged to support the political 
riews of the French monarch. His answer is a 
striking specimen of casuistic subtlety. He be- 
gins by establishing a distinction between adher- 
ing to the erroneous principles professed by a 
church, and the protection given to it "ostensibly , 
to preserve public tranquility.^^ He calls the 
Edict of Nantes, by which the Huguenots were, 
for a time, tolerated, "a kind of protection to the 
reformed^ shielding them from the insults of those 
who would trouble them in the exercise of their re- 
ligion. It never was thought (adds Bossuet) that 
the conscience of the monarch was interested in 
these concessions, except so far as they were judged 
necessary for public tranquility. The same may be 
said of the king of England; and if he grant great- 
er advantages to his Protestant subjects, it is be- 
cause the state in which they are in his kingdoms^ 
and the object of public reposcy require if.*' Speak- 



56 



ing ef the Articles, the Liturgy, and the Homiliesr 
**it is not asked (he says) that the king should he- 
come the promoter of these three things, but only 
that he shall ostensibly leave them a free course^ 
for the peace of his subjects.'' ^^The Catholics 
(he concludes) ought to consider the state in which 
they are, and the small portion they form of the 
population of England; which obliges them not to 
ask what is impossible of their king, but on the 
contrary, to sacrifice all the advantages with 
which they might vainly flatter themselves, to the 
real and solid good of having a king of their re- 
ligion, and securing his family on the throne, 
though Catholic; which may lead them naturally 
to expect^ in time, the entire establishment of their 
church andfaith.^'^ 

Such is the utmost stretch which can be given 
to the Roman Catholic principles in the toleration i 
of a church which dissents from the Roman faith. 
A conscientious Roman Catholic may, for the sake 
of public peace, and in the hope of finally servings 
the cause of his church, ostensibly give a free course 
to heresy. But, if it may be done without sucki 

* See the whole of Bossuet's answer in note R.. 



dangers, it is his unquestionable duty to under- 
mine a system of which the direct tendency is, in 
his opinion, the spiritual and final ruin of men* 
Is there a Catholic divine who can dispute this 
doctrine? Is there a learned and conscientious 
priest among you, who would give absolution to 
such a person as, having it in his power so to di- 
rect his votes and conduct in parliament as to di- 
minish the influence of Protestant principles, 
without disturbing or alarming the countiy, would 
still heartily and steadfastly join in prfimoting the 
interest of the English chiirrh ? Let the question 
be proposed to any Catholic university; and, 
though I am fully aware of the inexhaustible re- 
sources of casuistry, I should not fear to stake the 
force of my argument upon its honest and con- 
scientious answer. 

The author of the Book of the Roman Catholic 
Church rejects as a gratuitous imputation what- 
ever is attributed to that church, without the ex- 
press authority of one of her definitions of faith. 
I will only remind those who are well acquainted 
with the Roman Catholic system of divinity, that 
in w hat relates to moral and practical principles, 
such ;referenccs cannot fairly be demanded. The 



38 



definitions of your church upon such points are 
very few. Some moral doctrines have been cen- 
sured as lax, some as being of a depraving tend- 
ency; but the consciences of Catholics are guided 
by the broad rules of action acknowledged by all 
Christians. In the application of these rules there 
is, indeed, some variety of opinion among your 
moralists; for as they often dwell upon imaginary 
cases, an ample field is left to ingenuity for all the 
shifts and turns of expediency. The doctrine, 
however, *hat he, who being able to prevent a 
sin allows its commission^ is guilty of that sin 
and its consequences, requii^es no sanction from 
Pope or council. No Christian will ever deny 
this position; and even a deist, if he is to preserve 
consistency, will be obliged to admit its justness. 
This being so, it follows with unquestionable cer- 
tainty that a Roman Catholic cannot, without 
guilt, lend his support to a Protestant establish- 
ment, but is bound, as he wishes to save his soul, to 
miss no opportunity of checking the progress of 
heresy: the most grievous of all moral offences, 
according to the doctrines of the Roman Catholic 
church. Murder itself is less sinful, in the judg- 
ment of the Roman see, than a deliberate separa- 



58 

tion from her communion and creed. I need* not 
prove this to those who are disposed to recognize 
the Roman Catholic doctrines in the face of the 
world; but if any one still doubts the place which 
heresy holds in the Roman Catholic scale of crim- 
inal guilt, let him explain away, if he can, the 
following passage of the papal bull which is every 
year published in the Spanish dominions, under 
the title of The Cruzade. By that bull, every 
person who pays a small sum towards an imagi- 
nary war against infidels, is privileged to be re- 
leased from all ecclesiastical censures and receive 
absolution at the hands of any priest, of all, what- 
ever sins, he may have committed, ''even of those 
censures and sins which are reserved to the apos- 
tolic see, the crime of heresy excepted."* Is it 
then to cherish, foment, and defend this heinous 
crime— the crime which the Pope exempts from 
the easy and plenary remission granted to the 
long list of abominations left for the ear of a 
common priest— is it this crime, as established, 

* "Que puedan elegir Confesor Secular o Regular, de los 
aprobados por el ordinario, y obtener de el plenaria indul- 
gencia, y retnision de qualquiera pecados y censuras, aun de 
los reservados, y reservadas a la Silla Apostolica, ecepto el 
crimen de heregia." Bula de la Cruzada. 



80 



honoured, and endowed by the law of England, 
that you are anxious to sanction with your votes 
in p|,jrli2|,5jient? 

Suppose, for a moment, that it were possible for 
such a state as that of the Old Man of the Moun- 
tain or Prince of the Assassins, to have grown 
into a powerful nation, and reduced a Christian 
people under its dominion, without extinguish- 
ing their faith: the condition of these Christians 
would have greatly differed at two different 
periods. Before a sad experience had convinced 
them of the inadequacy of their power to overcome 
those enemies of God and man, they would natural- 
ly have fought openly and manfully against the 
assassin establishment, or died martyrs in passive 
resistance. When finally subdued, two courses 
alone would be left open: either to keep their 
hands clean from blood, by declining all participa- 
tion in the acts of the government, or join it with 
the intention of checking, by indirect means, the 
commission of an interminable series of crimes, 
secured by the constitutional laws of the state. Is 
there, I ask, any difference between this case and 
that of real Roman Catholics under a Protestant 
government, whose very essence is to maintain a 



61 



sepaTation from the communion of Rome, thereby 
placing millions of souls in a state which, you are 
bound to believe, cancels their title to salvation as 
Christians? 

I am awai^e that a practical sense of the ab* 
surdity of this tenet of your church has forced 
many of you to avert their eyes from it, and 
persuade themselves that it is possible to be a 
Roman Catholic without holding the absolute ex- 
clusion of heretics from the benefits of Christ's 
redemption. This, believe me, is an error. Ex- 
amine that profession of faith in which your 
church has set forth her fundamental doctrines, 
and you will find that she positively confines sal- 
vation to her members, and makes this very ar- 
ticle a necessary condition for reception within 
her pale.^ Your English catechisms endeavour 
to throw a sort of veil on this docti'ine, by stating 
that Protestants may be saved if they labour un- 
der invincible ignorance of the true Roman Ca- 
tholic faith: leaving such as are unacquainted 



* « This true Catholic faith, out of which noxe cait be 
SAVED, which I now freely profess and truly hold, /. •?V*. 
promise, vow, and swear, most constantly to hold," &c. &Cr 
Creed e/Pius IV. 

E 



62 



with their theological language to understand that 
by invincible ignorance^ is meant unconquerable 
conviction* But has the church of Rome ever 
modified her declarations against heretics, even 
with that poor and degrading exemption of igno- 
rance? Will the learned conviction of a Melanc- 
thon, a Calvin, a Grotius, an Usher, and the 
innumerable host of Protestant luminaries, pass 
under the humble denomination of that ignorancCy 
on which Catholic divines allow a chance of eter- 
nal happiness to pagans and savages? I{ sincere 
conviction is a valid plea with the Roman Catho- 
lic Church, why has she scattered to tlie winds 
the ashes of those who allowed that conviction to 
be tried in her inquisitorial fires? 

I rejoice to find the dogma of intolerance brand- 
ed in the Book of the Roman Catholic Church with 
the epithet of detestable;^ but cannot help 
wondering that a man who thus openly expresses 
his detestation of that doctrine should still profess 
obedience to a see, under whose authority the in- 
quisition of Spain was re-established in 1814. 
If Catholics are so far improved under the Pi*o- 
testant government of England as to be able to 

* Book of the Roman Catholic Churchy p. 303, 1st ed» 



63 



detest persecution, by what intelligible distinction 
do they still find it consistent to cling to the source 
of the intolerance which has inundated Europe 
w ith blood, and still shows its old disposition un- 
changed, wherever it preserves an exclusive in- 
fluence? In what church did Spain learn the ne- 
cessity of forbidding her subjects, for ever^ the 
right of choosing their religious tenets, and that 
at the very moment when she w as proclaiming a 
free constitution? Who has induced the republi- 
can governments of Spanish America to copy the 
same odious law in their new codes ? — That 
church, no doubt, who looks complacently on such 
acts and declarations, in countries where even 
her silence stamps public doctrines with the cha- 
racter of truth. Yesj the *^ detestable dogma of 
religious intolerance^^ is publicly and solemnly 
proclaimed in the bosom of the Roman Catholic 
Church, without a single observation against it 
from the Pope or bishops of that churchj nay, the 
legislators themselves are forced to proclaim and 
sanction it against their own conviction, because 
the mass of the people are allowed by the churcb 
to understand that such are their duty and her 
belief. 



64< 



If the Roman Catholic Church can thus allow 
detestable dogmas to act in full force within the 
inmost recesses of her hosom, those Catholics who 
differ from her notions, so far as her apologist^ 
Mr. Butler, might guide themselves in religious 
matters without the assistance of her infallibility. 
That able writer allows himself to be blinded by 
the spirit of party, when he labours to prov€ that 
intolerance does not belong exclusively to his 
Church; and charges Protestants with persecu- 
tion. That Protestants did not at once perceive 
the full extent of the fundamental principle of the 
Reformation — ^the inherent right of every man to 
judge for himself on matters of faith— can neither 
invalidate the truth of that luminous principle, 
nor bind subsequent Protestants to limit its ap- 
plication. It is a melancholy truth, that Protes- 
tants did persecute at one time; but it is a truth 
which rivets the accusation of inherent and essen- 
tial intolerance upon that Church, whose errone- 
ous doctrines the patriarchs of the reformation 
could not cast off at once. Thanks be to the pro- 
tecting care of that Providence, which, through 
them, prepared the complete emancipation from 
religious tyranny which Protestants enjoy at this 



65 



moment^ the infallibility of their churches made 
no part of the common belief on which they agreed 
from the beginning, or the spirit of intolerance 
would only have changed its name among us. 
The dogma of an infallible judge of religious sub- 
jects is the true source of bigotry; and whoever 
believes it in his heart, is necessarily and consci- 
entiously a persecutor. A fallible Church can 
use no compulsion. If she claim ^ ^authority on 
matters of faith, it is to declare her own creed to 
those who are willing to be her members. The 
infallible judge^ on the contrary, looks on his pre- 
tended gift as a miraculous, divine commission, 
to stop the progress of what he condemns as an 
error. He persecutes and punishes dissenters, 
not because they cannot be convinced by his rea- 
sons, but for obstinate resistance to his superna- 
tural authority. Rome never doomed her oppo- 
nents to the flames for their errors, but their con- 
titmacy. It is by this means that she has been 
able so often to extinguish sympathy in the breasts 
of her foUowersj for error excites compassion, 
while rebellion never fails to kindle indignation. 
The Roman Catholics have been accused of 
holding a doctrine which justifies them in not 
E 2 



66 



keeping faith with heretics. This charge is false 
as it stands; but it has a foundation in truth, 
which I will lay before you, as an important con- 
sequence of the claims of your church to infal- 
libility. The constant intercourse with those 
whom you call heretics, has blunted the feeling of 
horror which the Roman Church has assiduously 
fomented against Christians who dissent from 
her. It is, indeed, a happy result of the Refor- 
mation, that some of the strongest prejudices of 
the Roman Catholics have been softened where- 
ver the Protestant religion has obtained a footing. 
Where this mixture has never taken place, tru^ 
Roman Catholics remain nearly what they were 
in the time when Christendom rejoiced at the 
breach of faith, .which committed Huss to the 
flames by the sentence of a general council. In 
England, however, far from pretending to such 
unfair advantages, the Roman Catholics resent 
the suspicion that their oaths, not to interfere 
with the Protestant establishment, may be annuls 
led by the Pope. The settled and sincere deter- 
mination to keep such oaths, in those who appear 
ready to take them, I will not question for a mo- 
mentj but I cannot conceal my persuasion, that it 



67 



is the duty of every Roman Catholic pastor to 
dissuade the members of his flock from taking 
oaths which, if not allowed in a spirit of the most 
treacherous policy, would imply a separation from 
the communion of the Church of Rome. Let me 
lay down the doctrine of that church on this im- 
portant point. 

I will assume the most liberal opinion of the 
Catholic divines, and grant that the Pope cannot 
annul an oath in virtue of his dispensing power. ^ 
But this can only be said of a lawful oath; a 
quality which no human law can confer upon an 
engagement to perform a sinful act. A promise 
under oath, to execute an immoral deed, is in 
itself a monstrous offence against the divine law; 
and the performance of such a promise would only 
aggravate the crime of having made it. There 
are, however, cases where the lawfulness of the 

* Thomas Aquinas, whose authority is most highly re- 
verenced in these matters, maintains, however, that there 
exists a power in the church to dispense both with a vow, 
which, according to him, is the most sacred of aU engagements, 
and, consequently, with an oath. Sicut in voto aliqua neces- 
sitatis seu honestatis causa potest fieri dispensation ita et in 
Juramento, Secunda Secundac Quest. Ixxxix. Art. tx. The 
popes, in fact, have frequently exercised this dispensing 
power with the tacit consent of the church. 



68 



engagement is doubtful, and the obligation bur- 
densome, or, by a change of circumstances, inex- 
pedient and preposterous. The interference of 
the Pope, in such cases, is, according to the liberal 
opinion which I am stating, improperly called 
dispensation. The Pope only declares that the 
original oath, or vow, was null and void, either 
from the nature of the thing promised, or from 
some circumstances in the manner and form of 
the promise; when, by virtue of his authority, 
the head of the church removes all spiritual re- 
sponsibility from the person who submits himself 
to his decision. I do not consider myself bound 
to confirm the accuracy of this statement by 
written authorities, as I do not conceive the pos- 
sibility of any Roman Catholic divine bringing it 
into question. 

The Roman Catholic doctrine on the obligation 
of oaths being clearly understood, smcere members 
of that church can find no difficulty in applying 
it to any existing test, or to any oath which may 
be tendered, in future, with a view to define the 
limits of tlieir opposition to doctrines and practices 
condemned by Rome. In the first place, they can- 
not but see that an oath binding them to lend a 



69 



dii'ect support to any Protestant establishment, or 
to omit such measures as may, without finally in- 
juring the cause of Catholicism, check and disturb 
the spread and ascendency of error; is in itself 
sinful, and cannot, therefore, be obligatory. In 
the second place it must be evident that if, for 
the advantage of the Catholic religion suffering 
under an heterodox ascendancy, some oaths of this 
kind may be tolerated by Catholic divines, the 
head of that church will find it his duty to de- 
clare their nullity upon any change of circum- 
stances. The persevering silence of the Papal see 
in regard to this point, notwithstanding the advan- 
tages which an authorized declaration would give 
to the Roman Catholics of Great Britain avd Ire- 
land, is an indubitable proof that the Pope cannot 
give his sanction to engagements made in favour 
of a Protestant establishment. Of this, Bossuet 
himself was aware, when to his guarded opinion 
upon the scruples of James II. against the corona- 
tion oath, he subjoined the salvo; — ^^I nevertheless 
submit with all my heart to the supreme decision 
of his Holiness. ^^ If that decision, however, was 
then, and is now, withheld, notwithstanding the 
disadvantages to which the silence of Rome sub- 



70 



jects the Roman Catholics, it cannot be supposed 
that it would at all tend to remove them. To 
such as are intimately acquainted with the Ca- 
tholic doctrines, which I have just laid before 
you, the conduct of the Roman see is in no way 
mysterious. 

It would be much more difficult to explain upon 
what creditable principle of their church, the Ca- 
tholic divines of these kingdoms can give their 
approbation to oaths tendered for the security of 
the Protestant establishment. The clergy of the 
church of England have been involved in a ge- 
neral and indiscriminate charge of hypocrisy and 
simulation, upon religious matters. It would ill 
become one in my peculiar circumstances to take 
up the defence of that venerable body;^ yet I 
cannot dismiss this subject without most solemnly 
attesting, that the strongest impressions which 
enliven and support my Christian faith, are de- 
rived from my friendly intercourse with members 
of that insulted clergy; while, on the contrary, 
i knew but very few Spanish priests whose 

* since writing this passage, a most spirited and modest de- 
fence of the church of England clergy has been published by 
Doctor Blomfield, Lord Bishop of- Chester. 



71 



talents or acquirements were above contempt, 
who had not secretly renounced their religion. 
Wliether something similar to the state of the 
Spanish clergy may not explain the support 
which the Catholic priesthood of these kingdoms, 
seem to give to oaths so abhorrent from the be- 
lief of their church, as those which must precede 
the admission of members of that church into 
parliament; I will not undertake to say. If there 
be conscientious believers among them, which I 
will not doubt for a moment, and they are not 
forced into silence, as I suspect it is done in 
similar cases'^, I feel assured that they will 
earnestly deprecate, and condemn all engagements 
on the part of the Roman Catholics, to support and 
defend the church of England. Such an engage- 
ment implies either a renunciation of the tenet 
excluding Protestants from the benefits of the 

• I recollect something" about the persecution of one Mr. 
Gandolphy, a London priest, who was obliged to appeal per- 
sonally to Rome ag-ainst the persecution of his brethren, for 
exposing too freely the doctrines which might increase the 
difficulties of Catholic emancipation. The Pope did not con» 
demn him. — Since writing this note I have seen the case of 
Mr. Gandolphy stated in an able publication of the Rer. 
George Croly, entitled Popery and the Popish Qu€Stion» Mr» 
O.'s doctrines were highly approved at Romet 



7® 



Gospel promises, or a shocking indifference to 
the eternal welfare of men. 

If your leaders, whom it would be uncharitable 
to suspect of the latter feeling, have so far receded 
fi'om the Roman creed as to allow us the common 
privileges of Christianity, and can conscientious- 
ly swear to protect and encourage the interests of 
the church of England, let them, in the name of 
truth, speak openly befoi^e the world, and be the 
first to remove that obstacle to mutual benevo- 
lence, and perfect community of political pri- 
vileges — the doctrine of exclusive salvation in 
your church. Cancel but that one article from 
your creed, and all liberal men in Europe will 
offer you the right hand of fellowship. Your 
other doctrines concern but yourselves; this en- 
dangers the peace and freedom of every man 
living, and that in proportion to your goodness: 
it makes your very benevolence a curse. Believe 
a man w'ho has spent the best years of his life 
where Catholicism is professed without the check 
of dissenting opinions; where it luxuriates on the 
soil, w^hich fire and sword have cleared of what- 
ever might stunt its natural and genuine growth; 
a growth incessantly watched over by the head of 



78 



your church, and his authorized representatives^ 
the Inquisitors. Alas! ''I have a mother^^^ out- 
weighed all other reasons for a change, in a man 
of genius, ^ who yet cared not to show his indiffer- 
ence to the religious system under which he was 
born. I, too, ^^had a mother,'' and such a mother 
as, did I possess the talents of your great poet, 
tenfold, they would have been honoured in doing 
homage to the powers of her mind and the good- 
ness of her heart. No woman could love her 
children more ardently, and none of those chil- 
dren was more vehemently loved than myself. — 
But the Roman Catholic creed had poisoned in 
her the purest source of affection. I saw her, 
during a long period, unable to restrain her tears 
in my presence. I perceived that she shunned 
my conversation, especially when my university 
friends drew me into topics above those of domes- 
tic talk. I loved her; and this behaviour cut me 
to the heart. In my distress I applied to a friend 
to whom she used to communicate all her sor- 
rows; and, to my utter horror, I learnt that, sus- 
pecting me of anti-catholic principles, my mother 

** Pope: see his letter to Atterbury on this subject. 
F 



74 



was distracted by the fear that she might be 
obliged to accuse me to the Inquisition, if I in^ 
cautiously uttered some condemned proposition 
in her presence. To avoid the barbarous neces- 
sity of being the instrument of my ruin, she 
could find no other means but that of shunning 
my presence. Did this unfortunate mother over- 
rate or mistake the nature of her Roman Catho- 
lic duties? By no means. The Inquisition was 
established by the supreme authority of her 
church; and, under that authority, she was en- 
joined to accuse any person whatever, whom she 
might overhear uttering heretical opinions. No 
exception was made in favour of fathers, children, 
husbands, wives: to conceal was to abet their er- 
rors, and doom two souls to eternal perdition. — 
A sentence of excommunication, to be incurred 
in the fact, was annually published against all 
persons, who having heard a proposition directly 
or indirectly contrary to the Catholic Faith^ 
omitted to inform the inquisitors upon it. Could 
any sincere Catholic slight such a command? 

Such is the spirit of the ecclesiastical power to 
which you submit. The monstrous laws of which 
I speak, do not belong to a remote pei'iod: they 



75 



existed ill full force fifteen years ago: they were 
republished, under the authority of the Pope, at 
a later period. If some of your writers assume 
the tone of freedom which belongs to this age 
and country; if you profess your Faith without 
compulsion; you may thank the Protestant laws 
which protect you. Is there a spot in the uni- 
verse where a Roman Catholic may throw off his 
mental allegiance, except where Protestants have 
contended for that right, and sealed it with their 
blood? I know that your church modifies her 
intolerance according to circumstances, and that 
she tolerates in France, after the revolution, the 
Hugonots, whom she would have burnt in Spain 
a few years ago, and whom she would doom to 
some indefinite punishment, little short of the 
stake, at this present moment* Such conduct is 
unworthy of the claims which Rome contends for, 
and would disgrace the most obscure leader of a 
paltry sect If she still claims the right of wield- 
ing ^^the sword of Peter, '^ why does she conceal 
it under her mantle? If not, why does she not 
put an end to more than half the miseries and 
degradation of Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Span- 
ish America, by at once declaring that men are 



76 



accountable only to God for their religious belief ^ 
and that sincere and conscientimis persuasion must 
both in this and the next worlds be a valid plea 
for the pardon of error? Does the Church of 
Rome really profess this doctrine? — It is then a 
sacred duty for her to remove at once that scan- 
dal of Christianity, that intolerance which the 
conduct of Popes and councils has invariably up- 
held.^ But if, as I am persuaded, Rome still 
thinks in conformity Avith her former conduct, 
and yet the Roman Catholics of these kingdoms 
dissent from her on this point, they have already 
begun to use the Protestant right of private judg- 
ment upon ONE of the articles of their faith; and I 
may hope that they will follow me in the exami- 
nation of that alleged divine authority by which 
they are prevented from extending it to all* 

POSTSCRIPT- 

Want of books, or rather want of sufficient 
health to undergo the fatigue and discomfort of 
consulting them in public libraries, had made me 
proceed in the composition of these Letters, de- 

* Note C. 



77 



riving the materials from my own stores, and 
from the book itself against the general tendency 
of which I was induced to take up the pen. My 
knowledge of the Roman Catholic doctrines led 
me soon to conclude that Mr. Butler was a wri- 
ter who, on the fairest consti'uction, knew how to 
divert his adversaries from all the weak points of 
his cause. Yet I trusted that the accuracy of his 
quotations might be depended upon, especially 
when he gave us authorized statements of the 
Roman Catholic tenets. The translation of the 
creed of Pius IV., which Mr. Butler inserted in 
his Book of the Roman Catholic Church, was, 
therefore, the only document of that kind from 
which I deduced my arguments to prove the duty 
incumbent on Roman Catholics to propagate their 
religion by every means in their power. Whether 
I have succeeded or failed in proving that fact by 
inference, my readers will decide. But upon a 
revision of my arguments, I do not regret that 
an omission which I subsequently discovered in 
Mr. Butler's translation of that creed deprived 
me, at first, of the easiest and most direct proof 
which I could wish to support my assertion. For 
had I consulted the original at once, the positive 



78 



tonfirmation which that document gives it, and 
my own familiar conviction of its truth, would 
have induced me to save myself the exertion of 
fully developing my argument. As it now hap- 
pens, I flatter myself that my readers will give 
me some credit for accuracy in the knowledge of 
the Roman Catholic doctrines, when they shall 
see that a theoretical reasoning from her estab- 
lished general principles, fully and accurately 
agrees with a positive injunction of the Church 
of Rome, of which lapse of time had made me 
forget the existence. 

Let us, then, compare the last article in Mr. 
Butler's translation of the creed, with the original. 

Mr. Butler's translation: ^^This true Catholic 
faith, out of which none can be saved, which I 
now freely profess, and truly hold, I, JV., promise, 
vow, and swear most constantly to hold and pro- 
fess the same whole and entire, with God's as- 
sistance, to the end of my life. Amen." 

The latin original: — ^^Hanc veram catholicam 
fidem, extra quam nemo salvus esse potest, quam 
in prsesenti sponte profiteor, et veraciter teneo^ 
candem integram, et inviolatam, usque ad extre- 
mum vitse spatium constantissime (Deo adju- 



79 



vante) retinere et confiteri, atque a meissub« 

DtTIS, VEL ILLIS QUORUM CURA AD ME IN MU- 
NERE MEO SPECTABIT, TENERI, DOCERI, ET 
PR^DICARI, QUANTUM IN ME ERIT, CURATU- 
RUM EGO IDEM N. SPONDEO, VOVEO, AC JURO.'^ 

Now, the words in small capitals, omitted by 
Mr. Butler, contain the very pith and marrow of 
the strongest argument against the admissibility 
of Roman Catholics to parliament. For if the 
most solemn profession of their faith lays on eve- 
ry one of her members who enjoys a place of in- 
fluence, the duty of ^ ^procuring j that all under 
him^ by virtue of his office, shall hold, teach^ and 
preach the doctrines of the Roman Catholic 
Church, and this under an oath and vow; how 
can such men engage to preserve the ascendancy 
of the Church of England in these realms? 

When, in the New Times of the 5th of April, 
I exposed this important omission before the pub- 
lic, I thought that Mr. Butler would have ex- 
plained the origin of it. But I am not aware of 
liis having given any explanation. Neither on 
that, nor on the present occasion, is it my inten- 
tion to cast a suspicion on that gentleman^s good 
faith. He probably copied from some garbled 



80 



translation, prepared by less scrupulous mem- 
bers of his communion, who wished to conceal 
the real tenets of their church from a Protestant 
public. At all events, this fresh instance of in- 
accuracy on a most important point, gives addi- 
tional propriety to caution in reading Mr. But- 
ler's defences of Catholicism. 



LETTER III. 

Examination of the title to infallibility^ spiruuui 
supremacy, and exclusive salvation, claimed by 
the Roman Catholic Church* Internal evidence 
against Rome, in the use she has made of her as- 
sumed prerogative* Short method of determining 
the question* 

At the conclusion of my preceding Letter, I 
entreated you to examine the title by which your 
church deprives her members of the right of 
private judgment on religious matters, and denies 
salvation to those who venture to think for them- 
selves. In making this request I may appear to 
have overlooked the very essence of your religious 
allegiance, and to demand a concession which 
would at once put you out of the pale of the Ro- 
man church. But I beg you to observe, that 
whatever be the extent of the authority of that 
church over you, there is one point which it can- 
not withhold from the judgment and verdict of 
your reason. The reality of her title to be the 
guide and rule of your faith, must be a matter. 



82 



not of authority, but of proof. He that claims 
obedience in virtue of delegated power, is bound 
to prove his appointment. Any attempt to de- 
prive those who without that appointment would 
be%iis equals, of the liberty to examine the au- 
thority, nature, and extent of the decree which 
constitutes the delegate above them; is an in- 
vasion of men's natural liberty, as well as a 
strong indication of imposture. If before we 
come to God we must, through nature, believe 
that he is, surely before we yield our reason to 
one who calls himself God^s Vicar, our reason 
should be satisfied that God has truly appointed 
him to that supereminent post. 

How then stands the case between the church 
of Rome and the world? 

The church of Rome proclaims that Jesus 
Christ, both God and man, having appeared on 
earth for the salvation of mankind, appointed the 
apostle Peter to be his representative; made him 
the head of all the members of his church then 
existing; and granted a similar privilege to Petei'^s 
successors, without limitation of time. To this 
she adds, that, to the church, united under Peter 
ajid liis successors, Christ ensured an infallible 



83 

knowledge of the sense of the Scriptures, and an 
equally infallible knowledge of certain traditions, 
and their true meaning. On the strength of this 
divine appointment, the church of Rome demands 
the same faith in the decisions of her head, when 
approved "hj the tacit assent or open consent of 
the greatest part of her bishops/^ as if they pro- 
ceeded from the mouth of Christ himself. The 
divine commission, on which she grounds these 
claims, runs in these words of Christ to the chief 
of his apostles: ^^Thou art Peter, and upon this 
rock I will build my churchy- and the gates of hell 
shall not prevail against it: And I will give unto 
thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and what- 
soever thou Shalt bind on earth shall be bound in 
heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, 
shall be loosed in heaven. ^^ 

It will not be denied that, between this un- 
questionable authority and the statement which 
precedes it, there is no verbal agreement. A man 
unacquainted with the system of divinity sup- 
ported by the church of Rome, would, probably, 
perceive no connexion betw een the alleged passage 
and the commentary. But let us suppose that 
these words of our Saviour contain the meaning 



84 

111 qiiestiou: yet no man will deny, that if they do 
contain it, it is in an indirect and obscure manner. 
The fact then is, that even if the church of Rome 
should be really endowed with the supernatural 
assistance which she asserts, the divine founder 
of Christianity was pleased to make the existence 
of that extraordinary gift one of the least obvious 
truths contained in the Gospels. It might have 
been expected, however, that Peter, in his Epistles, 
or in the addresses to the first Christians which 
the Acts record, would have removed the ob- 
scurity; and that, since the grant of infallibility 
to him, to his peculiar church, and to his suc- 
cessors in the see of that church (either inde- 
pendently of the infallibility of others, or in com- 
bination with other privileged persons,— for this is 
also left in great obscurity) was made the only 
security against the attacks of hell; he would have 
taken care to explain the secret sense of Christ's 
address to him, Peter, however, does not make 
the slightest allusion to his privileges. His suc- 
cessors being not named in the supposed original 
grant of supremacy, it was in course that, by an 
express declaration, Peter would obviate the na- 
tural inference, that they were excluded fi*om his 



85 



^wn personal prerogatives. But Peter is equally 
silent about his successors; and to add to the ori- 
ginal mysteriousness of the subject, he never men- 
tions Rome, and dates his epistles from Babylon. 
Babylon may figuratively mean Rome; the silence 
of both our Saviour and his apostle may, by some 
strange rule of interpretation, be proved to denote 
those successors: the whole system, in fine, of the 
Roman Catholic church may be contained in the 
alleged passage; but, if so, it is contained like a 
diamond in a mountain. The plainest sense of 
any one passage of the Scriptures cannot be so 
palpable as the obscurity of the present. It fol- 
lows, therefore, with all the force of demonstra- 
tion, that the divine right claimed by the Pope 
and his church to be the infallible rule of faith 
having no other than an obscure and doubtful 
foundation, the belief in it cannot be obligatory 
on all Christians; who are left to follow the sug- 
gestions of their individual judgment as to the 
obscure meaning of the Scriptures, till the Scrip- 
tures themselves shall be found to demand the 
resignation of that judgment. 

I request you to observe, that the force of my 

argument does not depend upon the erroneous- 
G 



86 



ness of the Roman interpretation of the passages 
alleged for the spiritual supremacy; all I contend 
for is the doubtf^dness of their meaning: for to 
suppose that the divine founder of Christianity, 
while providing against doubt in his future fol- 
lowers, would miss his aim by overlooking the 
obscurity in which he left the remedy he wished 
to appoint; is a notion from which Christians 
must shrink. It follows, therefore, either that 
Christ did not intend what the Romanists believe 
about Peter and his church; or that, since he 
concealed his meaning, an obedience to the Roman 
church cannot be a necessary condition in his 
disciples. 

The liberty which, upon the supposition most 
favourable to Rome, Christ has granted to be- 
lievers in his Gospel, the Pope and his church 
most positively deny them. Placing themselves 
between mankind and the Redeemer, they allow 
those only to approach him, who first make a full 
surrender of tlieir judgment to Popes and councils. 
A belief in Christ and his work of redemption, 
grounded on the Scriptures and their evidences, 
is thus made useless, unless it is preceded by a 
belief in Roman suprcmacy, grounded on mere 



87 

surmises. Christianity is removed from its broad 
foundation, to place the mighty fabric upon the 
moveable sand of a conjectural meaning. 

This looks more like love ofselfthanof Christj 
more like ambition than charity. The title to in- 
fallibility and supremacy being at the best doubt- 
ful, the benefit of the doubt should have been left 
to Christian liberty. — But may not the opposite 
conduct of the Roman church have arisen* from 
sincere zeal for what she conceived to be the true 
intention of Christ? Christian candour would de- 
mand this construction, were it not for the use 
she has made of the assumed privilege: yet if we 
find that, having erected herself into an organ of 
Heaven, all her oracular decisions have invariably 
tended towards the increase of her own power; it 
will be difficult to admit the purity of her inten- 
tions. 

By comparing the articles of the church of 
Rome with those of the church of England, we 
shall find that the points of difference are chiefly 
these: tradition, transubstantiation, the number of 
sacraments, purgatory, indulgences, and the in- 
vocation of saints. Such are the main questions on 
doctrine, at issue between the two churches; for 



88 



the differences about free-will and justification 
might, I believe, be settled without much dif- 
ficulty, by accurately defining the language on 
both sides. Now, I will not assume the truth of 
the Protestant tenets on these points, nor enter 
into arguments against those of the Roman church; 
my present concern is with their tendency. 

To begin with tradition: let us observe how 
broaS a field is opened to the exercise of infalli- 
bility, by the supposition that an indefinite number 
of revealed truths, were floating down thesti^eam 
of ages, unconsigned to the inspired records of 
Christianity. The po wer of interpreting the word 
of God by a continual light from above, might be 
confined by the Scriptures themselves, as it would 
be diflicult to force doctrines on the belief of 
Christians, of which the very name and subject 
seem to have been unknown to the inspired writers. 
Divine tradition, the first-born of infallibility , re- 
moves this obstacle; and, so doing, increases the 
influence of Rome to an indefinite extent. I do 
not here contend that to place tradition upon the 
same footing with the Scriptures, is an error; but 
whether error or truth, it is certainly power in the 
hands of the Roman church. 



89 



By the combined influence of tradition and in- 
/allibilityj the church of Rome established the doc- 
trine of Transiibstantiation. From the moment 
that people are made to believe that a man has 
the power of w orking, at all times, the stupendous 
miracle of converting bread and wine into the 
body and blood of Christ; that man is raised to a 
dignity above all which kings are able to confer. 
What, then, must be the honour due to a bishop, 
who can bestow the power of performing the mi- 
racle of transubstantiation ? What the rank of the 
Pope, who is the head of the bishops themselves? 
The world beheld for centuries, the natural conse- 
quences of the surprising belief in the power of 
priests to convert bread and wine into the incar- 
nate Deity. ^ Kings and emperors were forced to 
kiss the Pope's foot, because their subjects were in 
the daily habit of kissing the hands of priests — 
those hands which were believed to come in fre- 
quent contact with the body of Christ. 

The abundance of ceremonies supposed to pro- 
duce supernatural effects, must magnify the cha- 
racter of the privileged ministers of those ceremo- 



* Note D. 
G 2 



90 



nies. Hence a church possessing seven sacraments, 
is far superior in influence to one who acknow- 
ledges but two. Add to this the nature of four 
out of the five Roman sacraments — penance, ex- 
treme unction, ordination, and matrimony — and 
the extent of power w^hich she thereby obtains, 
will appear. Penance, i. c. auricular confession, 
puts the consciences of the laity under the direc- 
tion of the priesthood. Extreme unction is one 
of her means to allay fear and remorse. Ordina- 
tion is intimately connected with the influence 
which the Roman church derives from transub- 
stantiation, and its being made a sacrament adds 
probability to the miraculous powers which it is 
supposed to confer. Finally, by giving the sacra- 
mental character to matrimony, the source and 
bond of civil society is directly and primarily sub- 
jected to the church. 

There still remain three exclusive offsprings of 
tradition, explained and defined by infallibility, 
which yield to none in happy consequences to the 
Roman church, — indulgences, purgatory, and the 
worship of saints, relics, and images. 

The wealth which has flowed into the lap of 
Rome, in exchange for indulgences, is incalcula- 



91 



ble. Even in the decline of her influence, she 
still looks for a considerable part of her revenues 
from this source: to which also she owes the de- 
gree of subjection in which she keeps the Roman 
Catholic governments. My unfortunate native 
country shows the nature and extent of this influ- 
ence in a striking light. I have already mention- 
ed the Bull of the Criixade^ through which the bar- 
ter of indulgences and dispensations for money, 
is carried on, in a manner worthy of the darkest 
ages. The Spanish government has two or three 
paltry fortresses on the coast of Africa, which are 
employed as places of punishment for criminals. 
The existence of a few soldiers in these garrisons 
is construed into a perpetual war against the In- 
jidelSj with whom, in the mean time, the King of 
Spain is mostly at peace, from inability to oppose 
to them an effectual resistance. The see of Rome, 
which wants but a slight pretext to spiritualize 
whatever may open a market for its wares, calls 
this state of things between the Spaniards and the 
Africans a perpetual war against inJidelSf which 
being, according to the principles of that see, a 
meritorious Christian act, deserves its pastoral 
encouragement For this purpose, every year 



92 



are printed summaries of a Papal bull, which the 
Spaniards purchase at different prices, according 
to their rank and wealth, in order to enjoy the 
indulgences and privileges granted by the Pope in 
exchange for their alms. The benefits to be de-. 
rived from the possession of one of these bulls, 
are several plenary indulgences, and leave to eat, 
during Lent, milk, eggs, and butter, which are 
otherwise forbidden, under pain of mortal sin, at 
that season. The sale of these privileges having 
been found most valuable and extensive, a second, 
third, and even a fourth bull, of a similar kind, 
were devised. The Jiesh bull, as it is called in 
Spain, allows the purchasers to eat meat during 
Lent, every Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and 
Thursday, except in Passion Week. The third 
bull is called the compounding bull. By posses- 
sing one of these documents, and giving a certain 
sum, at the discretion of any piiest authorised to 
hear confessions, to the fund of the holy cru%ade$ 
and property may be kept, which, having been 
obtained by robbery and extortion, cannot be 
traced to its right ow ners for restitution. This 
composition with the Pope and the King, is made 
by depositing the sum appointed by the confessor 



93 



in an iron chest fixed outside the doors of church- 
es: a comfortahle resource indeed for the tender 
consciences of peculators and extortioners, two 
very numeraus classes in Spain. The fourth bull 
is to be purchased for the benefit of the deceased, 
and is called the defunct bull. The name of any 
dead person being entered on the bull, a plenary 
indulgence is, by this means, believed to be con- 
veyed to his soul, if suffering in purgatory. To 
secure, however, a double sale, the three latter 
bulls are made of no effect, unless the original 
summarij of the cruzade be possessed by the per- 
son who wishes to enjoy the dispensations and 
privileges therein set forth. It is also a very 
common practice to bury these bulls with the 
corpses of those whom they are intended to bene- 
fit. The tax thus levied upon the people of Spain, 
is divided between the King and the Pope: yet it 
is not the money which, in this and similar trans- 
actions, proves most beneficial to Rome; the ha- 
bit of spiritual dependence which it supports 
among the Spaniards is, no doubt, its most valu- 
able result to that see. The Spanish Cortes, who 
were bold enough to reduce the tithes by one half^ 
when struggling hard to shake off the silent yet 



94 



formidable influence of the Pope, found theii* 
power inadequate to the task: well knowing that 
were he to w ithdraw one of these bulls, the mass 
of the people would instantly rise against them. 
I have selected this fact among thousands, that 
prove the accession of power which the doctrine 
of indulgences produces to the see of Rome. 

The belief in purgatory is so inseparable from 
the former tenet, that I need not enlarge on the 
peculiar advantages which Rome has derived from 
it. I will only observe how fortunately for the 
interests of the church of Rome, not only the ex- 
istence, but even the mutual help and connexion 
of her peculiar doctrines, have happened. The 
power of remitting canonical penance would have 
been useless on the cessation of penitential disci- 
pline: but TRADITION having about the Same time 
brought purgatory to light, offered an ample 
scope to the power of the Roman keys. Transub- 
stantiation now presented the means of repeating 
the sacrifice of the cross for those who were sup- 
posed to be undergoing the purification by fire. 
The whole system, indeed, is surprisingly linked 
together, and the very connexion of its parts, 
finding to secure the influence and power of the 



95 



source from ^vhence it flows, gives it the appear-^ 
ance of an original invention, enlarged from the 
gradual suggestions of previous advantages. 

The worship of saints, relics, and images might, 
when tradition hegan to spread it, have appeared 
less connected with the wealth and power of the 
church of Romej yet none of its spiritual resources 
has proved more productive of both. Europe is 
covered with sanctuaries and churches, which 
owe their existence and revenues to some report- 
ed miraculous appearance of an image, or the pre- 
sence, real or pretended, of some relic. To form 
a correct notion of the influence which such pla- 
ces have upon the people, it is necessary to have 
lived where they exist. But the house of Loretto 
alone, would be sufficient to give some idea of the 
power and wealth which the church must have 
derived from similar sources, when the whole of 
Christendom was more ignorant and superstitious 
than the most degraded portions of it are at pre- 
sent. Of this fact, however, I am perfectly con- 
vinced by long observation, that were it possible 
to abolish sanctuaries, properly so called, and 
leave the same number of churches without the 
favourite virgins and saints which give them both 



96 



that peculiar denomination and their populav 
charm; more than lialf the blind deference which 
the multitude pay to the clergy, and through the 
clergy to Rome, would quickly disappear. 

The advantages resulting to Rome from the 
Qpmbined effect of indulgences, relics, saints and 
their images, are not, however, derived only in- 
directly through the deference enjoyed by her 
clergy. The bond thereby created between the 
Pope and the most distant regions which acknow- 
ledge his spiritual dominion, is direct. The 
Mexican and the Peruvian expects the publication 
of the annual bull, which allows him to eat eggs 
and milk in Lent, enables him to liberate, by 
name, a certain number of his relations from pur- 
gatory, and enlarges the power of his confessor, for 
the absolution of the most hideous crimes. Wher- 
ever he turns, he sees a protecting saint, whose 
power and willingness to defend him, could not be 
ascertained w ithout the supernatural and unques- 
tionable authority of the Pope. It is the Holy 
Father who, by a solemn declaration, allots every 
district to the peculiar patronage of a saint^ it is 
he who, by grants of indulgences, encourages the 
worship of those miraculous images wliicli form 



97 

central points of devotion over all the Roman 
Catholic world: it is he who warrants the super- 
natural state of incorruption of the body of one 
saint, and traces, with unerring certainty, some 
straggling limb to another. It is, finally, he who 
alone has the undoubted power ofvirUially furnish- 
ing the faithful with the relics of the most ancient 
or unknown patriarchs and martyrs, by bidding 
the fragment of any skeleton in the catacombs, be 
part of the body in request* 

I do not intend to cast any part of your re- 
ligious system into ridicule^ though, I confess, it 
is difficult to mention facts like these, without 
some danger of exciting a smile. These and 
similar practices you will, perhaps, construe into 
innocent means of keeping up a sense of religion 
among the lower classes; but without insisting, 
at present, upon their demoralizing and degrading 
tendency, I only present them in conjunction with 
all the other means of power and influence which 
the church of Rome has draw n from the, at least, 

* This IS called christening relics. The persuasion that 
bones so christened are as good as those of the favourite 
saint to whom they are attributed, is certainly general in 
my country. I have no doubt that it is common to all Catho^ 
lies. 

H 



9b 



doubtful title, on which she grounds her spiritual 
supremacy. It is, indeed, of great importance in 
the question between Rome and the Protestants, 
to observe the consequences of their respective 
interpretation of scripture, in regard to their own 
interests. The mass of Christians who, unable 
to weigh the theological arguments urged by the 
controversialists of both parties, content them- 
selves with an implicit, and often an indifferent, 
acquiescence inthe tenets which educationchanced 

to impress on their minds; might form a pretty 
accurate notion of the whole case by the following 
easy and compendious method. They should, in 
the first place, endeavour to become familiar with 
the reasoning which shows the absurdity of settling 
the question of papal supremacy on other than 
Scriptural grounds. Let them remember, what 
cannot be too much repeated, the necessity of de- 
riving the knowledge of any infallible expounder 
of the Scriptures from the testimony of those 
Scriptures, perused and understood without the 
aid of that expounder. To appeal to diviiui tra- 
dition as a rnle for the interpretation of Scripture 
in this state of the question, is equally unreason- 
able jiHd preposterousj since, from the nature of 



99 



the case, there is, as yet , no iiifallihle rule to dis- 
tinguish divine tradition ft^om human and fallible 
report. The next step in this momentous in- 
quiry, is to ascertain, by human means, the true 
sense of such passages of the Scriptures as are 
said to contain the appointment of a living su- 
preme authority in matters of faith. Here, two 
sets of men, deeply learned in all the branches of 
divinity, present themselves as interpreters. 
These affirm that the passages in question, contain 
the rights and privileges which the church of Rome 
and her head, claim for themselves: those posi- 
tively deny that the passages can bear such mean- 
ing* Remember again, I request you, that the 
decision must depend exclusively on the reasoning 
faculties of mankind. Which, now, of these two 
opposed masses of intellect, is most likely to catch 
the true meaning of the texts? Which of the two 
interpretations have we most reason to suppose 
free from the distortions of prejudice? Common 
sense answers the question: that which is directly 
against tiie interests of the intei'preters. Europe 
lay prostrate at the feet of the Pope, and every 
member of his clergy was raised by the common 
opinion, to a rank and dignity to which eveii 



100 

kijigs bowed their head. The meanest priest 
claimed and enjoyed exemptions which were often 
denied to the first nobles of the land. Wealth and 
honours were theirs; the law shrunk before them 
when guilty, and piety was ready to throw a 
cloak on their vices. The church had, for many 
ages, been in possession of unrivalled power on 
earth, when, at the rousing voice of a few obscure 
men, who questioned the foundation of that 
mighty structure, a large portion of those that 
might have continued under its shelter, unani- 
mously declared that the whole was a work of 
delusion, which had sprung from an original, un- 
examined error. Such was the unanimous con- 
viction of all the Protestants, when no bias but 
that of a contrary tendency could exist in their 
minds. If common sense, therefore, must be the 
interpreter of divine authority, conveyed to us in 
human language; this fact alone suffices to point 
the side to which that plain and faithful guide 
gives its sanction. 

The Reformed churches are taxed with their 
variations, as if, like Rome, they had pledged 
their existence upon infallibility. They have, 
indeed, varied and dissented from each other; 



101 

with this difference from the oracular church of 
the Vatican, that they have not disguised their 
proceedings, nor set up an Inquisition as the guard 
of their unity. But while the love of truth com- 
pelled the Reformers to expose themselves to the 
insults and raillery of their mortal enemies, hy 
breaking into parties upon the more abstruse 
points of divinity; not even a doubt has disturbed 
their unanimity as to the insufficiency of the title 
to divine supremacy, by which Roin# commands 
intellectual homage. That, indeed, was the only 
point of controversy which common sense could 
decide; and the renunciation of all the worldly 
advantages to which the Roman church invited 
the Reformers, had left their judgment unbiassed. 
Other disputes in divinity must be settled by a 
long, difficult, and laborious process of inquiry; 
but a privilege is a matter of fact which, if not 
evidently proved, becomes a nonentity. Now, the 
peculiar privilege claimed by Rome, essentially 
precludes doubtful proofs of its existence. A 
doubtfd gift from God with a view to remove 
dmibty is a mockery of his w isdom. If the common 
sense of many learned and unbiassed minds is 

found to agree in denying that the Scripture pas- 
EC 2 



103 

sages alleged by Rome, in favour of her mira- 
culous infallibility, contain a clear promise of that 
gift, or describe in whom, and how it was to exist 
after the decease of the apostlesj the pretensions 
of the Pope and his church must be visionary. 
The negative proof, in such cases, — the absence 
of a clear title — has the strength of demonstra- 
tion. Nothing can weaken its force upon a candid 
mind, but the^reiy common habit of starting away 
from newly^discovered truth in fear of its conse- 
quences, which we have previously condemned. 

I am aware that, unable as you must be to find 
a direct and sufficient answer to this argument, 
and inclined to admit its truth, as an honest mind 
will make you; yet a crowd of such consequences 
will deter you from the path into which reason is 
ready to lead you. — A church subject to error and 
division! — You shrink from such an inference, 
without remarking that the preco?imre(i and un- 
proved necessity of having an infallible church, is 
the true and only source of that illogical process, 
by which you have endeavoured to establish the 
rertain existence of infallibility, upon the uncer- 
tain sense of a few words of the Gospel. 



LETTER IV. 

A spedmeii of the unity exhibited by Rome. Somafi 
Catholic distinction between infallibility in doc- 
trinCj and liability to misconduct. Consequences 
of this distinction. Roman Catholic unity and 
invariableness of Faiths a delusion. Scriptiiral 
unity of Faith. 

**So long since as the council of Vienne (I quote 
the words of your great champion Bossuet, trans- 
lated by your apologist Mr. Butler^) a great pre* 
late, commissioned by the Pope to prepare matters 
I to be treated upon, laid it down for a ground- 
work to the whole assembly, that they ought to 
reform the church in the head and members. The 
great schism which happened soon after, made 
this saying current, not among particular doctors 
only, as Gersen, Peter dMilly, and other great 
men of those times, but in councils too; and nothing' 
was more frequently repeated in those of Fisa 
and Constance. What happened in the council of 

* Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p. 156, 1st ed» 



104 

'Basil, where a reformation teas unfortunately 
eluded, and the church re-involved in new divi- 
sions, is well known." Such is the picture of the 
Roman Catholic church at the heginning of the 
fifteenth century, drawn by the most able as well 
as cautious of her divines. The distinct mention 
of the unfortunate cause whicli prevented the pro- 
posed Reformation, would have given more colour 
and individuality to the picture. It was, in fact 
a revival of the great schism^ which for fifty years 
had lately kept the Roman Catholic church divi- 
ded between two or thre'e Popes, who at one and 
the same time, claimed the prerogative of vicars 
of Christ: it was a fierce contest between the 
council of Constance and Eugenius IV., the Pope 
who had convened it, and whom the assembled 
bishops wished to reform: it was a sentence of ex- 
communication issued by the council against Eu- 
genius: it was a rival council convoked atFerra- 
ra by the excommunicated Pope, where he em- 
ployed the same arms against the fathers assem- 
bled at Basil: it was the deposition of Eugenius 
and the installation of Felix V. by the offended 
council: it was, in fine, the triumph of Rome 
against the spirit which had attempted to execute 



105 

the work, of which ^'^great prelates/' ^^particulai* 
doctors/V and ^•councils too/' spoke so frequent- 
ly, as to establish it into a ^ ^current saying/' that 
the church needed reform in head and members. 
The head, unwilling to be reformed, imprecated 
the curse of Heaven upon tlie members; and the 
members finding that head incurable, chose for 
themselves another, when they had duly devoted 
the refractory one to the unquenchable fire. Such 
are the * ^well-known" events which took place in 
*^the council of Basil, where a reformation was un- 
fortunately eluded, and the church re^nvolved in 
new dirisions.^^ 

And now, I will ask, is this the unity, the 
harmony, without which your writers contend 
that the church of Christ cannot exist? Is it 
tlms that the necessity of your interpretation of 
the Scripture passages, on which the system of 
infallibility has been erected, is sanctioned by ex- 
perience? Can you still close your eyes against 
the demonstration contained in my preceding 
letter, because variations and dissent are in the 
train of its consequences ? 

^^Our troubles and dissentions, however, (you 
are tawght to answer) are limited to externals^ 



106 

those of the Protestants affect the unity of the 
faith/* Such is the last shelter, the citadel, of 
your infallible-church theory. See, then, the 
series of assumptions, doubts, and evasions of 
which that theory consists, and observe its in- 
evitable consequences. 1st. You assume that 
which is in question, the necessity of an infallible 
judge of faith. 2dly. Upon the sti'ength of that 
assumption, you interpret certain passages of 
Scripture, so that they are made to prove the 
existence of such a judge. 3dly. You are then 
in doubt as to the identity of the judge himself, 
without being able to determine by any fixed 
rule, whether the supernatural gift of infallibility 
belongs to the Pope alone, or to the Pope and the 
general council.^ 4thly. When, to evade this 
difficulty, you avail yourselves of the term church, 
as embracing the privileges of the Pope and 
councilj you are still obliged to contrive another 
method, which may meet the objections arising 
from such dissentions between the assembled 
bishops and their head, as took place in the in- 
stances above mentioned. This you do by allow- 

^ Note F. 



lor 

ing no council to be infallible till it has been 
approved by the Pope, and thus resolve church 
infallibility into the opinion of the Roman see. 
othly, and finally, You intrench yourselves w ithin 
the distinction of infallibility on abstract doctrines 
of faith, and liability to practical error. Now, ob- 
serve, I entreat you, the consequences to which 
the whole system leads. The only sensible mark 
of a legitimate council, being the approbation of 
the Pope; and the only sensible mark of a legiti- 
mate Pope, being his undisputed possession of the 
see of Rome; you have, in the first place, entailed 
the gift of infallibility upon the strongest of the 
rival candidates for that see; and, as moral worth 
is, by the last distinction, denied to be a necessary 
characteiistic of the vicar and representative of 
Christ, you have added, in the second place, one 
chance more of having for your living ride of 
faith that candidate who shall contend for the 
visible badge of his spiritual and supernatural 
office, under the least restraint of moral obliga- 
tion. If we find, therefore, upon consulting the 
history of the Popes, that no episcopal see has 
oftener been polluted by wickedness and profligacy, 
fte fact is explained by the preceding statement 



108 

What chance of success to be head of the Christian 
church could attend a true disciple of Jesus, when 
a Borgia was bent upon filling that post? Gold, 
steel, and poison^ w ere the familiar instruments of 
his wisiies; whilst the belief that faith was still 
safe in the custody of such a monster, prevented 
opposition from the force of public opinion. The 
faithful still revered in Alexander VI. (be the 
blasphemy far from me!) the true representative 
of Christ on earth. 

The strength of mind which enables the refor- 
mers to disregard the generally received distinc- 
tion between exemption from doctrinal errors, and 
liability to misconduct, cannot be adequately va- 
lued by those who have never imbibed that scho- 
lastic prejudice. When a distinction of this kind 
has once become incorporated with common lan- 
guage, men seem to be placed out of the reach of 
conviction on the points it affects. If my obser- 
vation of intellectual phenomena do not deceive 
me, the mass of those who may be said to think at 
all can go no farther in a reasoning process, than 
just to perceive one difficulty against their settled 
notions, and to catch some verbal quibble which 
removes the difficulty from theii- sight. The pro- 



109 

cess of examining the usual fallacies of such an- 
swers is, to most men, so painful that any serious 
attempt to urge them upon it, seldom fails to 
rouse their anger. There are, indeed, but few 
who can take a true second step in reasoning. 

The stand which is generally made at the- first 
stage of an argument, is more resolutely taken 
when arguments are brought against a system 
which is itself a palliative of some previous ob- 
jection. The case now before us is perhaps the 
best illustration of my view of popular intellect. 

Christianity was at an early period systema- 
tized according to the notions and habits which 
some of its learned converts had acquired in the 
philosophical schools. It was soon presented to 
the world in the shape of a new theory, where 
the links which appeared to be wanting between 
the clearly revealed doctrines were supplied by 
the ingenuity of inference. Nothing, we know, 
is so opposed to this vulgar systematic spirit as 
taking facts as they are. The chasm between 
what is, and an assumed standard of what should 
be, must be filled up. Few men refuse to grant 
what is demanded with this objectj for fragments 
of real knowledge are not to the taste of the mul- 



110 

titude. Having agreed that the Gospel was a 
revelation from Grod, they could not conceive the 
possibility of doubt affecting it directly or indi- 
rectly. Optimism is the system of the many: a 
revelation which could not remove every doubt, 
and silence every objection, must certainly fail 
to suit their previous notions. 

Had these Christians, however, studied the 
Scriptures without the bias of such notions, they 
would have found that the divine author of Chris- 
tianity has nowhere provided a remedy against 
doubt and dissent. There were heretics when 
the church was still under the personal guidance 
of the Apostles; yet the New Testament mentions 
them without allusion to any infallible method of 
ending these first disputes on doctrines. On a 
practical question, indeed, we find that St. Paul 
was sent to ask the opinion of the church of Jeru- 
salem; yet, that very opinion was, in part, set 
aside and neglected, soon after, by the tacit con- 
sent of most other churches. ^ The natural infer- 

* The injunction against eating blood and suffocated ani- 
mals, though given as from the Holy Ghost, was considered 
as of mere temporary expediency, and set aside as soon as 
heathen converts formed the majority of Christians, 



Ill 

ence from such facts is, that the analogy of God^s 
moral government was not broken in the direct 
revelation which he made to the world through 
his own son; but, having granted us convincing 
proofs that the Scriptures contain the knowledge 
supernaturally vouchsafed to man, he has left the 
search thereof to human industry. Industry sup- 
poses difficulty, and difficulty implies danger. — 
The field of moral discipline does not appear to 
have been changed by Christianity: the light, in- 
deed, thrown upon it is clearer, and ^Hhe high 
prize of our calling'^ is made fully to shine in 
our eyes; but it nowhere appears that we ai'e 
therefore to close them, and run blindly after cer- 
tain men endowed with supernatural vision. 

Such sober reasoning upon /ac^5, could not be 
popular in the Christian church. An infallible 
judge of abstract questions was wanting, and one 
was soon found; for St Peter was the chief of 
the Apostles, and Rome the chief of cities. No- 
thing, therefore appeared more natural^ than that 
Peter should be bishop of Rome; and little proof 
of this fact was demanded: tradition, a mere re- 
port, was sufficient for those who wished it to be 
so. Yet something more was necessary to fulfil 



lis 

the object of the first theory or supposition; for 
Peter could not live for ever, and the judge of 
faith was to exist till the end of the world. But 
what could be more natural than that Petei'^s 
successors should inherit his supernatural gifts? 
In popular logic^ wliat is natural^ i. e. what 
agrees with some original supposition, is certain. 
Subsequent doubts, arising from a system so 
naturalj must be settled any way, or left unset- 
tled. Whetiier infallibility belonged to the Pope 
alone, or to the Pope and the church, and who 
was to be considered the church — these minutiae 
were left for the ingenuity of divines. The Pope 
and Rome were all in all for the mass of Chris- 
tians. The effects of uncontrolled power, howe- 
ver, soon became visible in the monstrous cor- 
ruptions of Rome herself. Here the second step 
of popular intellect was required, viz. to seize 
the happy distinction of infallibility in doctrine, 
and profligacy in morals. Who that loves wealth, 
power, and pleasure, would wish to be a sinless 
oracle? No: the systelh of spiritual supremacy 
was now complete: the original supposition, that 
the church could not resist the attacks of hell 
without an unerring judge of abstract questions. 



113 

had been followed to its remotest consequencesj 
he that ventui*ed to doubt the accuracy of the 
whole theory was declared a heretic. The Pope 
might be, in his conduct, an enemy of Christ and 
his Gospel, and nevertheless succeed in the en- 
joyment of whatever privileges were granted to 
Peter, in consequence of the love which, above 
the other Apostles, he bore to his divine master.* 
He might be a monster of vice, yet he did not 
cease to be vicar of him who did no sin. The 
church, under his guidance, might be corrupt in 
^^head and members;^' but still she must be infal- 
lible in matters of faith. 

To the solidity of this structure have your di- 
vines committed the stability of the church of 
Christ: unless all this be true, the gates of hell 
have actually prevailed against her. A moral 
corruption in head and members; a system wliich 
ensured the continuance of this corruption, by 
repeatedly defeating the efforts of those who wish- 
ed for a reformation, were, if we believe them, 
no subject of triumph to the enemy of God and 

• Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these? 
He saith unto him. Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee^ 
He saith unto him^ Feed my lambs. — John xxi. 15. et seq, 
I 2 



114 

man* As long as the authority of Rome was 
safe, the gates of hell had still the worst of the 
contest: let the Pope possess the heads of Chris- 
tians, and Satan was welcome to their hearts. — 
'^The followers of Luther/' says Bossuet,^ ^ ^as- 
suming the title of reformers, gloried that they 
had fulfilled all Christendom's desires, inasmuch 
as a reformation had been long the desire of 
Catholics, people, doctors, and prelates. In or- 
der, therefore, to authorise this pretended refor- 
matiorij whatsoever church-writers had said 
against the disorders, both of the people and even 
of the clergy, was collected with great industry. 
But in this lay a manifest conceit, there not be- 
ing so much as one of all the passages alleged, 
wherein these doctors ever dreamt of altering the 
church's faithj of correcting her worship, which 
chiefly consisted in the sacrifice of the altar; of 
subverting the authority of her prelates, that of 
the Pope especially— the very scope which this 
whole reformation, introduced by Luther, tended 
to." 

If there be any conceit in the matter, it is that 
of admitting the extreme corruption of the Chris- 

• Ubi supra: 



115 

tian church, with the unavailing efforts of the 
advocates of reform, who preceded Luther; and 
yet blaming the Protestants because, by making 
the Pope^s supremacy the ^^very scope'' of their 
reformation, they took the only effectual method of 
putting an end to the evil. The absurd notion 
that the unity of the church of Christ depended 
on unity with the bishop of Rome, tied the hands 
of all Christians who wanted either the knowledge 
or the courage to examine the airy basis of that 
system. 

The sword and thefaggoU besides, stood in the 
way of approach to that delicate point; else the 
invectives so carefully restricted to morals would 
not have always left the doctrines untouched. 
Submit your understanding to Rome; confess that 
you cannot hope for salvation out of the Pope's 
communion; acknowledge that immorality and 
wickedness do not detract from his supernatural 
privileges; and, on these conditions, you are at 
liberty to oppose the corruptions of the church of 
Christ. Conceit is not, indeed, a word which I 
should apply to such advice: deceit would seem 
more appropriate. 

Invariableness in doctrine is Bossuet's criterion 



116 

of tlie Christian characteristic oitinity; but surely 
any set of men, who agreed on a system similar to 
that on which Roman unity depends, might equally 
boast of invariableness and unity: surely there 
cannot be, at least there cannot appeal*, any dif- 
ference of opinion in a society which excludes 
every member who does not submit his owti 
views to those of one individual, placed at its 
headj and which lays dow^n, as an indubitable 
fact, that that individual, whoever he may happen 
to be, and whatever he may add to the common 
doctrines of the society, always speaks the mind 
of his predecessors, and only gives explicitness to 
things implied in former decisions. Such is the 
artful contrivance which the author of the Varia- 
ations of the Protestant Churches disguises into a 
miraculous unity of doctrine and belief; the effect, 
as he pretends, of Christ^s promise of support to 
his church against the gates of hell. Raking up, 
besides, all the calumnies and atrocious reports 
with which the character of the oppo^ers of Rome 
has been blackened at all times, and setting in the 
strongest light of mutual opposition the theolo- 
gical disputes which divided the reformers, he 
gives the whole w^eight of his authority and talents 



117 

to a delusion^ w hich nothing but an overwhelming 
combination of interest and prejudice could pre- 
vent his acute mind from perceiving. Had the 
Bishop of Meaux bestowed the ten-thousandth 
part of the perverse industry with which he fol- 
lowed that argument, in examining the gratuitous 
assumption on which it is founded, we may hope 
that his honesty would have directed his pen to 
some other topic. Instead of availing himself of 
the inveterate notion that Christ had established 
an infallible judge in his church, lest, by the exist- 
ence of doubt as to the sense of the Scriptures, 
there should be diversity of opinion among his 
followers — instead of taking it for granted, that 
the victory of hell depended on the diversity of 
abstract doctrines among Christians, and not in 
the prevalence of dark works of wickedness, pro- 
vided they were wrought in the unity of Papal 
faith — ^he should, in the spirit of philosophical 
reasoning, have penetrated to that part of the 
argument which conceals the gratuitous assump- 
tions whence the whole Roman Catholic theory 
has sprung. When Catholics have proved, with- 
out the aid of church authority j that the church of 
Christ must be infallible, then, and not before, 



118 

they may object their variations to the Protes- 
tants. 

The Protestants have varied in seaixh of the 
divine simplicity of the Gospel, which Rome had 
buried under a mountain of metaphysical notions. 
The Protestants have varied^ because they could 
not at once divest themselves of the habits of 
thinking which they had acquired in the Roman 
Catholic schools. The Protestants have varied^ 
because they had the honesty not to imitate the 
contrivances by which the Roman church gives 
to her new decisions the appearance of unity with 
the preceding. The Protestants have varied^ be- 
cause they would not, upon the fanciful notion of 
a perpetual miracle^ claim for any of their churches 
the supernatural gift of unerring wisdom, nor coun- 
terfeit by obstinacy in error, the conscious cer- 
tainty of inspiration. The Protestants, in fine, 
have varied^ because, by restoring the Scriptures 
to their full and unrivalled authority, they per- 
ceived the intrinsic power of settled, recorded, in- 
variable revelation; and were aware that, in spite 
of doubts and divisions, the light of those divine 
records needed no help to withstand the attacks 
of the gates of hell. 



419 

If mere controversy were my object, I should 
feel satisfied with having demonstrated that the 
system of Roman Catholic unity is but an arbi- 
trary contrivance; a gratuitous assumption of a 
supernatural privilege, w hich is nowhere clearly 
asserted in the Scriptures; an endeavour to pro- 
duce certainty by a standard conceived and plan- 
ned upon conjecture. A more Christian feeling, 
however, induces me to dwell still on this subject, 
and propose to you what I conceive to be the true 
scriptural notions on the unity of the church of 
Christ 

In reading the New Testament with a mind 
carefully freed from the prejudices of school- 
divinity, it is impossible not to perceive that the 
assemblies of men who are called to obtain salva- 
tion through Christ, cannot either singly or col- 
lectively constitute the church, whereof the Ro- 
man see has tried to appropriate the qualities and 
privileges to herself. Wherever men assemble in 
the name of Jesus, there he has promised to be by 
means of his spirit; and certainly the works of 
that spirit are more or less visible in the Chris- 
tian virtues, which never yet failed to spring 
up in these particular churches, though mixed 



ISO 

with the tares, and otlier evils, which are not sepa- 
rable from ^Hhe kingdom of heaven" in this world. 
But there is a structure of sanctity in perpetual 
progress, towards the completion of which the 
Christian churches, on earth, are only made to 
contribute as different quarries do towards the 
raising of some glorious building. The churches 
on earth partake, in various proportions, of the 
attributes of the great church of Christ, ^^ which is 
his body, the fulness of him that fiUeth all in 
all."^ But the church to which the great privi- 
leges and graces belong, has characteristic marks 
which cannot be claimed by any one of the church- 
es on earth; for it is that church ^^vhich Christ 
loved, and gave himself for it; that he might sanc- 
tify and cleanse it with the washing of water by 
the word, that he might present it to himself a 
glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any 
such thing; but that it should be holy and without 
blemish."! "To become members of that church 
we should, indeed, ^^endeavour to keep the unity 
of the spirit in the bond of peace;";}: but such unity 
is proposed as the effect of endeavour ^ and conse- 

* Rphes. i. 23. t Ephes. v. 25—27. 

* lb. iv. 3. 



121 

qiiently of choice and judgment, not of blind sub- 
mission to a silencing authority, which is the Ro- 
man bond of union. The true unity of Christians 
must arise from the <^one hope of our calling.^* 
There is indeed for us ^^one Lord, one faith, one 
baptism;'' but that faith is a faith of trust, a ^^con- 
fidence, which hath great recompense of reward,''^ 
not an implicit belief in the assumed infallibility 
of men, who make a monopoly of the wTitteu 
word of God, prescribe the sense in which it must 
be understood, and with a refined tyranny, which 
tramples equally upon Christian liberty, and the 
natural rights of the human mind, insult even 
silent dissent, and threaten bodily punishment to 
such as, in silence and privacy, may have indulged 
the freedom of their minds, f 

* Heb. X. 35. 
t Praeterca ad coercenda petulantia ing-enia, decernit 
(eadem sacrosancta synodus) ut nemosuce prudentioe innixus, 
in rebus fidei et morum, ad acdificationem doctrine Christians 
pertmentium, sacram Scripturam ad suossensus contorquens, 
contra eum sensura quern tenuit et tenet sancta mater ecclc- 
sia, cujus est judicare de vero sensu et interpretation e Scrip- 
turarum sanctarum, aut etiam contra unanimem consensum 
sanctorum patrum, ipsam Scripturam sacram interpretari au- 
deat, etiamsi hujuumodi interpretationes nullo unquam tempore 
in lucem edendx forent. Qui contravenerint per ordinarios 
dcclarentp et p<,nU a jure statutis pumantur.^BtQTetum 



122 

Such is the saving faith of the council of Trent! 
How different from that proposed by St. Paul, 
when he says, ^^if thou shalt confess with thy 
mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine 
heart that God hath raised him from the dead, 
thou shalt be saved,''^ ^^That is the word of 
faith which we preach,'' says St Paul; and well 
might that faith be made the bond of union be- 
tween all the churches which the Apostles salut- 
ed, without requiring a previous proof of their im- 
plicit submission. ^* Grace be with all them that 
love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity,'' is St. 
Paul's language. Cursed be they who, whatever 
be their love of Christ and veneration for the 
Scriptures, yield not obedience to the church of 
Rome; is the spirit of every page which has been 
published by Popes or councils. 

Whatever might be the effect of the prejudices 
which the first reformers brought away from their 
Raman captivity; whatever the necessity which 
Protestant churches still acknowledge of prevent- 
ing internal feuds, by proposing formularies of 

Concilii Trident, de editione et usu sacrorum Ubrorum, 
Sessionc IV. 



133 

faith to their memhers, they have never so mis- 
understood ^^vhat spirit they are of as to deny 
salvation to those who love their common Lord 
and Redeemer. Their churches, indeed, may 
differ on points which the subtilty of metaphy- 
sics had unfortunately started long before the 
reformation, and even before the publication of 
Christianity: they may observe different ceremo- 
nies, and adopt different views of church hierar- 
chy aYid discipline^ but their spirit is the only 
one which deserves the name of Catholic in the 
genuine sense of that wordj the only spirit, in- 
deed, which can produce, even on earth, an image 
of the glorious church which will exist for ever 
in onefold, and under one shepherd. 



LETTER V. 

Moral character of the Roman Church. Celebacy: 
JVimneries. 

The attempt to describe the moral character 
o£ a collective body, which, constantly changing 
its composition, can seldom consist of the same 
elements for any considerable portion of time, 
will probably appear rash and invidious. A long 
familiarity with the subject which I have in hand, 
has, however, convinced me, that if there be any 
truth in the general observation, that men who 
act under certain laws and interests, in collective 
bodies, are swayed by a peculiar influence, which, 
without borrowing a foreign phrase, might be 
called Corporation Spirit; the church of Rome 
presents the strongest and most marked instance 
of that moral phenomenon. Its great antiquity, 
and the gigantic power which it has enjoyed for 
ages, are the natural and intelligible causes of 
those fixed views and purposes which, existing at 

all times in the mass of its living members, must 

J 2 



136 

inevitably be imparted to its successive recruits- 
The character of no one man can be more indel- 
libly stamped by a long life of consistent, syste- 
matic conduct, than that of a collective body 
which, for many centuries, has practically learnt 
the true source of its power. If, on the other 
hand, it should appear that, in describing the 
moral character of that body which Catholics 
consider as the only depositary of divine authori- 
ty on earth, I bring a charge of guilt against the 
whole succession of men who have composed, and 
compose it at present; I must observe, that indi- 
vidual conduct, modified by corporate influence, 
cannot be judged by the common rules which 
guide us in estimating private character* That 
every inie Roman Catholic, every man whose 
religious tenets are in strict conformity with 
those of Rontie, must partake the spirit of his 
standard of faith, in proportion to his sincerity; 
my own experience would compel me to aver, in- 
dependently of any theoretical conviction. But 
the same experience teaches me that the natural 
disposition of every person, has a certain degree 
of power to modify, though not to neutralize, the 
Roman Catholic religious influence. — ^This being 



127 

premised, I will openly, before God and man, 
declare my conviction, that the necessity of keep- 
ing up the appearance of infallibility, makes the 
church of Rome, essentially and invariably, ty- 
rannicalj that it leads that church to hazard both 
the temporal and the eternal happiness of men, 
rather than alter what has once received the sanc- 
tion of her authority; and that, in the prosecution 
of her object, she overlooks the rights of truth, 
and the improvement of the human understand- 
ing. 

In the proof and substantiation of these charges 
I will strictly observe the conditions proposed for 
similar cases by the author of the Book of the 
Roman Catholic Church. ^'I beg leave to sug- 
gest,'' says Mr. Butler, ^^that, in every religious 
controversy between Protestants and Roman Ca- 
tholics, the following rule should be observed: — 
That no doctrine should be ascribed to 
THE Roman Catholics as a body, except 

6UCH AS IS AN ARX-ICLE OF THEIR FAITH.'^^ 

Now, it is agreed on all hands, that a canon of a 
general council, approved by the Pope — i. e. a 
rule of belief delivered to the people, under the 

* Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p, 9. 



.128 

fearful sanction of an miatheniay leaves no other 
alternative to a Roman Catholic but embracing 
the doctrine it contains, or being excluded from 
his church by excommunication. By one, then, 
of such canons, every member of the church of 
Rome is bound to believe that all baptized per- 
sons are liable to be compelled, by punishment^ 
to be Christians, or what is the same in Roman 
Catholic divinity, spiritual subjects of the Pope. 
It is, indeed, curious to see the council of Trent, 
who passed that law, prepare the free and ex- 
tended action of its claims, by an unexpected 
stroke of liberality. In the Session on Baptism^ 
the Trent Fathers are observed anxiously secur- 
ing to Protestants the privileges of true baptism. 
The fourth canon of that Session fulminates an 
anathema or curse against any one who should 
say that baptism in the name of the Father, the 
Son, and the Holy Ghost, conferred by a heretic, 
with an intention to do that which the church in- 
tends in that sacrament, is not time baptism. =^ — 

* Si quis dixerit baptismum, qui etiam datur ab hscreticis 
in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, cum intentione 
faciendi quod facit ecclesia, non esse verum baptismum, ana- 
thema sit.— Concil. Trident. Sess. VU. Can. IV. 



129 

Observe, now, the consequences of this enlarged 
spirit of concession in the two subjoined canons. 

^^Ifany one should say that those who have 
been baptized are free from all the precepts of 
the holy church, either WTitten or delivered by 
tradition, so that they are not obliged to observe 
them, unless they will submit to them of their 
own accord, let him be accursed.^'^ 

Having soon after declared the lawfulness of 
infant baptism, they proceed to lay down the 
XIV. Canon. 

<*If any one should say that these baptised 
children, when they grow up, are to be asked 
whether they will confirm what their godfathers 
promised in their name; and that if they say they 
will not, they are to be left to their own discre- 
tion, and not to be forced, in the mean time, into 
the observance of a Christian life btj any other 
punishment than that of keeping them from the 
reception of the eucharist and the other sacraments 
till they repent, let him be AccuRSED.'^t 

* Si quis dixerit, baptizatosliberos esse ab oinnibus sanctae 
Romanse ecclesiae prseceptis, qua vel scripta vel tradita sunt, 
ita ut ea observare non teneatur, nisi se sua sponte illis sub- 
mittere voluerint, anathema sit. 

t Si quis dixerit hujusmodi parvulos baptizatos, cum ado^ 



130 

Now, ^'it is most true/' says the author of the 
Book of the Roman Catholic Church, ^^that the 
Roman Catholics believe the doctrines of their 
church to be unchangeable; and that it is a tenet 
of their creed, that what their faith ever has been, 
such it was from the beginning, such it now is, 
and such it will ever be." Let him, therefore, 
choose between this boasted consistency of doc- 
trine, and the curse of his church. The council 
of Trent, that council whose decrees are, by the 
creed of Pius IV., declared to be obligatory above 
all othersj=^ that council has converted the sa- 
crament of Baptism into an indelible brand of 
slavery: whoever has received the waters of re- 
generation, is the thrall of her who declares that 



leverint, interrogandos esse, an ratum habere vellnt quodpa- 
trini, eorum nomine, dum baptizarentur, poUiciti sunt, et, 
ubi se noUe responderint, suo esse arbitrio relinquendos, nee 
alia interim pdsna ad Christianam vitajn cogtndosy nisi ut ab 
eucharistiae, aliorumque sacramentorum perceptione arcean- 
tur donee resipiscant, anathema sit. Can. VIII. et XIV. de 
Baptismo. 

* "I also profess and undoubtedly receive all other things 
delivered, defined, and declared by the sacred canons and 
general councils, particularly by the holy council of Trent, 
&c. &c." Creed of Pius IV. in the Book of the Roman Ca- 
tholic Church, p. 8. 



131 

there is no other church of Christ. She claims 
her slaves wherever they may be found, declares 
them subject to her laws, both written and tra- 
ditional, and, by her infallible sanction, dooms 
them to indefinite punishment, till they shall ac- 
knowledge her authority and bend their necks to 
her yoke. Such is^ has been^ and will ever 6e, the 
doctrine of the Roman Catholic church; such is 
the belief of her true and sincere members; such 
the spirit that actuates her views, and which, by 
every possible means, she has always spread 
among her children. Him that denies this doc- 
trine, Rome devotes to perdition. The principle 
of religious tyranny, supported by persecution, is 
a necessary condition of true Catholicism: he who 
revolts at the idea of compelling belief by punish- 
ment, is severed at once from the communion of 
Rome. 

What a striking commentary on these canons of 
the Council of Trent have we in the history of 
the Inquisition! Refractory Catholics born under 
the spiritual dominion of Rome, and Protestants 
originally baptized out of her pale, have equally 
tasted her flames and her racks. =^ Nothing, in 

♦ Llorente mentions the punishments inflicted by the Spa- 
nish Inqiusition on English and French subjects. 



13S 

deed, but want of power, nothing but the much- 
lamented ascendancy oiheresy^ compels the church 
of Rome to keep her infallible, immutable decrees 
in silent abeyance. But the divine authority of 
those decrees, the truth of their inspiration, must 
for ever be asserted by every individual who sin- 
cerely embraces the Roman C atholic faith. Reason 
and humanity must, in them, yield to the infallible 
decree in favour of compulsion on religious mat- 
ters. The human ashes, indeed, are scarcely cold 
which, at the end of three centuries of persecution 
and massacre, these decrees scattered over the soil 
of Spain. I myself saw^ the pile on which the last 
victim was sacrificed to Roman infallibility. It 
was an unhappy woman, whom the Inquisition of 
Seville committed to tlie flames under the charge 
of heresy, about forty years ago: she perished on 
a spot where thousands had met the same fate. I 
lament from my heart that the structure which 
supported their melting limbs, was destroyed dur- 
ing the late convulsions. It should have been pre- 
served, with the infallible and immutable canon of 
the Council of Trent over it, for tlie detestation 
of future ages. 
How far, to preserve consistency, Rome, in the 



183 

present time, would carry the right of punishing 
dissent, which her last general council confirmed 
with its most solemn sanction; it is not in my 
power to tell. It may be hoped that the spirit of 
the age has extinguished her fires for ever:=^ but 
the period I fear is still remote when she will 
change another part of her system, by which she 
ruins the happiness and morals of numbers, — I 
mean her monastic vows, and the laws which bind 
Catholic clergy to perpetual celibacy. 

Where church infallibility is concerned, I can 
readily understand the necessity imposed on the 
most liberal individuals who have filled the Roman 
see, to adhere strictly to former decrees and de- 
clarations; but nothing can excuse or palliate the 
proud obstinacy which Rome has always shown 
on such points of discipline, as might be altered 
for the benefit of public morals, without compro- 
mising her claims. Such are the laws which annul 
and punish the marriages of secular clergymen, 
and those which demand perpetual vows from them 
who profess any of the numerous monastic rules 
approved by the Roman church, both for males 
and females. 

♦ Note F. 

K 



134 

I will not discuss the question, whether a life 
of celibacy is recommended in the New Testament 
as preferable to matrimony at all periods, and in 
all circumstances of the church. I will suppose, 
what I do not believe, that virginity, by its own 
intrinsic merit, and without reference to some vir- 
tuous purpose, which may not be attainable other- 
wise than by the sacrifice of the soft passions of 
the heart; has a mysterious value in the eyes of 
God: a supposition which can hardly be made 
without advantage to some part of the ancient 
Manichsean system — without some suspicion that 
the law, by which the human race is preserved, is 
not the pure effect of the will of God. I will not 
assail such views, which, more or less, might be 
inferred from the writings of the Roman Catholic 
mystics. I will take up the subject on their own 
terms. Let virginity be the virtue^ not (as I be- 
lieve) the condition of angels: let it be desirable, 
as St. Augustine expresses himself somewhere^ 
that mankind were blotted from the face of the 
earth by the operation of celibacy.* Let all 

* T cannot tax my memory with the words, nor is the 
object worth the labour of a long- search. 1 believe that St, 
Aug^ustine, in answering the objection that, if all the world 



135 

this be so; yet are not celibacy and virginity des- 
cribed in the New Testament as peculiar and un- 
common gifts, as perilous trials, and likely to 
place human beings in a state which St. Paul 
compares to burning? Are not the warnings 
and cautions given by our Saviour and his Apos- 
tles, as frequent as the allusions to it? Did not 
St. Paul fear that the very mention of this topic 
might become a snare to his converts? — But how 
is the subject of virginity and celibacy treated 
by the Roman Catholic church? The world 
rings with the praises of the unmarried state, 
which her writers, her fathers, her Popes, her 
councils, have sounded from age to age. Not 
satisfied with placing it at the very summit of 
the scale of Christian virtue, they contrived the 
most cruel and insidious of all moral snares^ in 
the perpetual vows with which they secured the 
profession^ not the observance, of the virtue they 
extolled. St. Paul lamented that young widows, 
after devoting themselves to the service of the 
church, and living at the expense of her mem- 
followed the principle he recommended, the earth would 
soon be a desert, says, with an fiir of triumph — Oh felix 
mundi exitium! 



136 

bers, grew disorderly, and married, incurring 
Mavfie^ from the enemies of the Christian name, 
who scoflTed at their fickleness of purpose. Against 
this evil he provided the most rational remedy — 
that of receiving no widow to the service of the 
chut*ch, who was not threescore years old. The 
church of Rome, on the contrary, allures boys 
and girls of sixteen to bind themselves with per- 
petual vows: the latter are confined in prisons, 
because their frailties could not be concealed; 
the former are let loose upon the people, trusting 
that a superstitious reverence will close the eyes, 
or seal up the lips of men, on their misconduct. 
'^Christian clemency,'' says Erasmus, ^^has, for 
the most part, abolished the servitude of the an- 
cients, leaving but vestiges of it in a few coun- 
tries. But under the cloak of religion a new 
kind of slavery has been invented, which now 
prevails in a multitude of monasteries. Nothing 
there is lawful but what is commanded: whatever 
may accrue to the professed becomes the proper- 
ty of the community: if you stir a foot, you are 
brought backy as if flying after murdering your 

* The word damnation is, in its present sense, quite in- 
appropriate in this and several other passages. 



137 

father and mother.^ The Council of Trent en- 
joins all bishops to enforce the close confinement 
of mms, by every means, and even to engage the 
assistance of the secular arm for that purpose^ 
entreats all Princes to protect the inclosure of 
the convents; and threatens instant excommuni- 
cation on all civil magisti'ates who withhold their 
aid when the bishops call for it ^^Let no pro- 
fessed nun (say the fathers of the Council of 
Trent) come out of her monastery under any pre- 
text whatever^ not even for a moment." ^^If 
any of the regulars (men and women under per- 
petual vows) pretend that fear or force compelled 
them to enter the cloister, or that the profession 
took place before the appointed age; let them not 
be heard, except within five years of their pro- 
fession. But if they put off the frock, of their 
own accord, no allegation of such should be 
heard; but, being compelled to return to tlie con- 
vent, they must be punished as apostates^ being, in 
the mean time, deprived of all the privileges of 
their order.''! Such is the Christian lenity of 
Rome; such the fences that guard her virgin- 

* See the whole dialogue, Vir^ro MtGroyaftos*, Note H. 
f See the laws on this subject. Note I. 
K 2. 



138 

plots; such were the laws confirmed at Trent by 
the wild uproar of six hundred bishops, of whom 
but few could have cast the first stone at the adul- 
teress, dismissed to sin no more by the Saviour. 
^ ^Accursed, accursed be all heretics/' exclaim the 
legates: ^^Accursed, accursed,'' answer, with one 
voice, the mitred tyrants. =^ The blood, indeed, 
boils in one's veins, and the mouth fills with re- 
taliating curses, at the contemplation of that odi- 
ous scene: yet, I thank God, the feelings of in- 
dignation which I cannot wholly suppress, leave 
me completely free to obey the divine precept 
respecting those that ^^curse us, and despitefuUy 
use us." 

That my feelings are painfully vehement when 
I dwell upon this subject; that neither the free- 
dom I have enjoyed so many years, nor the last 
repose of the victims, the remembrance of whom 
still wrings tears from my eyes, can allay the bit- 
ter pangs of my youth; are proofs that my views 
arise from a real, painful, and protracted experi- 
ence. Of monks and friars I know comparative- 

*See the Acclamations in the last sessions of the Council 
of Trent. See also the state of morals among- the clergy^ ac- 
cording to tte avowal of the first legates. Note I. 



139 

ly little, because the vague suspicions, of which 
even the most pious Spanish parents cannot di- 
vest themselves, prevented my frequenting the 
interior of monasteries during boyhood. My 
own judgment, and the general disgust which the 
prevailing grossness and vulgarity of the regu- 
lars, create in those who daily see themj kept 
me subsequently away from all friendly inter- 
course with the cowled tribes: but of the secular 
clergy, and the amiable life-prisoners of the 
church of Rome, few, if any, can possess a more 
intimate knowledge than myself* Devoted to 
the ecclesiastical profession since the age of fif- 
teen, when I received the minor orders, I lived 
in constant friendship with the most distinguish- 
ed youths who, in my town, were preparing for 
the priesthood. Men of the first eminence in the 
church were the old friends of my family — ^my 
parents' and my own spiritual directors. Thus 
I grew up, thus I continued in manhood, till, at 
the age of five-and-thirty, religion, and religion 
alone, tore me away from kindred and country. 
The intimacy of friendship, the undisguised con- 
verse of sacramental confession, opened to me 
the hearts of many, whose exterior conduct might 



140 

have deceived a common observer. The coarse 
frankness of associate dissohiteness, left no se- 
crets among the spiritual slaves, who, unable 
to separate the laws of God from those of their 
tyrannical church, trampled both under foot, in 
riotous despair. Such are the sources of the 
knowledge I possess: God, sorrow, and remorse^ 
are my witnesses. 

A more blameless, ingenuous, religious set of 
youths than that in the enjoyment of whose friend- 
ship I passed the best years of my life, the world 
cannot boast of. Eight of us, all nearly of the 
same age, lived in the closest bond of affection, 
from sixteen till one-and-twenty; and four, at 
least, continued in the same intimacy till that of 
about thirty-five. Of this knot of friends not one 
was tainted by the breath of gross vice till the 
church had doomed them to a life of celibacy, 
and turned the best affections of their hearts into 
crime. It is the very refinement of church cruelty 
to say they were fi^ee when they deprived them- 
selves of their natural rights. Less, indeed, would 
be the unfeelingness of a parent who, watching a 
moment of generous excitement, would deprive a 
son of his birtliright, and doom him, by a volun- 



141 

tary act, to pine away through life in want and 
misery. A virtuous youth of one-and-twenty, who 
is made to believe Christian perfection inseparable 
from a life of celibacy, will easily overlook the 
dangers which beset that state of life. Those who 
made, and those who still support the unnatural 
law, which turns the mistaken piety of youth into 
a source of future vice; ought to have learnt mercy 
from their own experience: but a priest who has 
waded (as most do) through the miry slough of a 
life of incessant temptation — ^falling, and rising, 
stumbling, struggling, and falling again, without 
at once casting off Catholicism with Christianity; 
contracts, generally, habits of mind not unlike 
those of the guards of oriental beauty* Their 
hearts have been seared with envy. 

I cannot think on the wanderings of the friends 
of my youth without heart-rending pain. One, 
now no more, whose talents raised him to one of 
the highest dignities of the church of Spain, was 
for many years a model of Christian purity. 
When, by the powerful influence of his mind and 
the warmth of his devotion, this man had drawn 
many into the clerical, and the religious life (my 
youngest sister among the latter,) he sunk at once 



14S 

into the grossest and most daring profligacy. I 
heard him boast that the night before the solemn 
procession of Corpus Christie where he appeared 
nearly at the head of his chapter, one of two child- 
ren had been born, which his two concubines 
brought to light within a few days of each other. 
The intrigues of ambition soon shared his mind 
with the pursuit of pleasure; and the fall of a po- 
tentate, whom he took the trouble to instruct in 
the policy of Machiavel, involved him in danger 
and distress for a time. He had risen again into 
court influence, when death cut him off' in the 
flower of life. I had loved him when both our 
minds were pure: I loved him when Catholicism 
had driven us both from the path of virtue: I still 
love, and will love his memory, and hope that 
God^s mercy has pardoned his life of sin, with- 
out imputing it to the abetters of the barbarous 
laws which occasioned his spiritual ruin. 

Such, more or less, has been the fate of my 
early friends, whose minds and hearts were much 
above the common standard of the Spanish clergy. 
What, then, need I say of the vulgar crowd of 
priests, who, coming, as the Spanish phrase has it, 
from coarse swaddling clothes^ and raised by ordi- 



143 

nation to a rank of life for which they have not 
been prepared; mingle vice and superstition, gross- 
ness of feeling, and pride of office, in their charac- 
ter? I have known the best among them: I have 
heard their confessions; I have heard the con-, 
fessions of young persons of both sexes, who fell 
under the influence of their suggestions and ex- 
ample; and I do declare that nothing can be more 
dangerous to youthful virtue than their company. 
How many souls would be saved from crime, but 
for the vain display of pretended superior virtue, 
which Rome demands of her clergy! 

The cares of a married life, it is said, interfere 
with the duties of the clergy. Do not the cares 
of a vicious life, the anxieties of stolen love, the 
contrivances of adulterous intercourse, the pains, 
the jealousies, the remorse, attached to a conduct 
in perfect contradiction with a public and solemn 
profession of superior virtue — do not these cares, 
these bitter feelings, interfere with the duties of the 
priesthood? I have seen the most promising men 
of my university obtain country vicarages, with 
characters unimpeached, and hearts overflowing 
with hopes of usefulness. A virtuous wife would 
have confirmed and strengthened their purposes; 



444 

but they were to live a life of angels in celibacy. 
They were, however, men, and their duties con- 
nected them with beings of no higher description. 
Young women knelt before them, in all the inti- 
macy and openness of confession. A solitary house 
made them go abroad in search of social converse. 
Love, long resisted, seized them, at length, like 
madness. Two I knew who died insane: hun- 
dreds might be found who avoid that fate by a life 
of settled, systematic vice. 

The picture of female convents requires a moi^ 
delicate pencil: yet I cannot find tints sufficiently 
dark and gloomy to pourtray the miseries which 
I have witnessed in their inmates. Crime, indeed, 
makes its way into those recesses, in spite of the 
spiked walls and prison grates, which protect the ' 
inhabitants. This I know with all the certainty 
which the self-accusation of the guilty can give. 
It is, besides, a notorious fact, that the nunneries 
in Estremadura and Portugal are frequently in- 
fected with vice of the grossest kind. But I will 
not dwell on this revolting part of the picture. 
F The greater part of the nuns, whom I have known 
were beings of a much higher description — ^females 
whose purity owed nothing to tlie strong gates 



145 

and high walls of the cloisterf but who still had a 
human heart, and felt, in many instances, and 
during a great portion of their lives, the weight 
of the vows which had deprived them of their 
liberty. Some there are, I confess, among tlie 
nuns, who, like birds hatched in a cage, never 
seem to long for freedom: but the happiness boast- 
ed of in convents, is generally the effect of an ho- 
nourable pride of purpose, supported by a sense 
of utter hopelessness. The gates of the holy prison 
have been for ever closed upon the professed in- 
habitants^ force and shame await them wherever 
they might fly: the short words of theii^ profes- 
sion have, like a potent charm, bound them to one 
spot of earth, and fixed their dwelling upon their 
grave. The great poet who boasted that ^ ^slaves 
cannot lire in England,'' forgot that superstition 
may baffle the most sacred laws of freedom: slaves 
do live in England, and, I fear, multiply daily by 
the same arts which fill the convents abroad. In 
vain does the law of the land stretch a friendly 
hand to the repentant victim: the unhappy slave 
may be dying to break her fetters; yet death 
would be preferable to the shame and reproach 
that await her among relatives and friends. It 



146 

will not avail her to keep the vow which dooms 
her to live single: she has renounced her will, and 
made herself a passive mass of clay in the hands 
of a superior. Perhaps she has promised to prac- 
tise austerities which cannot be performed out of 
the convent — never to taste meat, if her life were 
to depend on the use of substantial food — to wear 
no linen — to go unhosed and unshod for life; — all 
these and many other hardships make part of the 
various rules which Rome has confirmed with her 
' sanction. Bitter harrassing remorse seizes the 
wavering mind of the recluse, and even a yielding 
thought towards liberty, assumes the character of 
sacrilege. Nothing short of rebellion against the 
church that has burnt the mark of slavery into her 
soul, can liberate an English nun. Whereto could 
she turn her eyes? Her own parents would dis- 
own her; her friends would shrink from her as if 
her breath wafted leprosy: she would be haunted 
by priests and their zealous emissaries; and, like 
her sister victims of superstition in India, be made 
to die of a broken heart, if she refused to return to 
the burning pile from which she had fled in fran- 
tic fear. 

Suppose that the case I have described were of 
the rarest occurrence: suppose that but one nun 



147 

ill ten thousand wished vehemently for that libei - 
ty which she had forfeited, by a few words, in one 
moment: what law of God (I will ask) has entitled 
the Roman church thus to expose even one hu- 
man creature to dark despair in this life, and a 
darker prospect in the next? Has the Gospel re- 
commended perpetual vows? Could any thing 
but a clea^' and positive injunction of Christ or 
his apostles justify a practice beset with dangers 
of this magnitude? Is not the mere possibility of 
repenting such vows a reason why they should be 
strictly forbidden? And yet they are laid on al- 
most infants of both sexes. Innocent girls of six- 
teen are lured by the image of heroic virtue, and 
a pretended call of their Saviour, to promise they 
know not what, and make engagements for a 
whole life of which they have seen but the dawn! 
To what paltry shifts and quibbles will not Ro- 
man Catholic writers resort to disguise the cruelty 
of this practice! Nuns are described as super-hu- 
man beings, as angels on earth, without a thought 
or wish beyond the walls of their convents. The 
effects of habit, of religious fear, of decorum, 
which prevented many of the French nuns from 
rasting off the veil, at a period when the revolu- 



148 

tionary storm had struck awe into every breast; 
are construed into a proof of the unvariableness 
of purpose which follows the religious profession. 
Are nuns, indeed, so invariably happy ? Why, 
then, are they insulted by their spiritual rulers 
by keeping them under the very guards and pre- 
cautions, which magistrates employ to secure ex- 
ternal good behaviour among the female inmates 
of prisons and penitentiaries? — Would the nuns 
continue, during their lives, under the same pri- 
vations, were they at liberty to resume the laical 
state? Why, then, are they bound fast with 
awful vows? Why are they not allowed to offer 
up, day by day, the free-Mill offering of their souls 
and bodies? 

The reluctant nuns, you say, are few. — ^Vain, 
unfeeling sophistry! First prove that vows are 
recommended on divine authority, that Christ 
has authorized the use of force and compulsion to 
ratify them when they are made; and then you 
may stop your ears against the complaints of a 
few sufferers. But can millions of submissive, or 
even willing recluses; atone for the despair of those 
few? You reckon, in indefinite numbers, those 
that in France did not avail themselves of the 



149 

revolutionary laws. You should rather inquire 
how many, who, before the revolution, appeared 
perfectly contented in their cloistral slavery, over- 
came every religious fear, and flew into the arms 
of a husband as soon as they could do it with im- 
punity. Twa hundred and ten nuns were secu- 
larized in Spain during the short-lived reign of 
the Cortes.^ Were these helpless beings happy 
in their former durance? What an appalling 
number of less fortunate victims might not be 
made out by averaging, in the same proportion, 
the millions of females w ho, since the establish- 
ment of convents, have surrendered their liberty 
into the hands of Rome! 

Cruel and barbarous, indeed, must be the bi- 
gotry or the policy which, rather than yield on a 
point of discipline, sees with indifference even the 
chance, not to say the existence, of such evils. To 
place the most sensitive, innocent, and ardent 
minds under the most horrible apprehensions of 
spiritual and temporal punishment, without the 
clearest necessity; is a refinement of cruelty which 
has few examples among civilized nations. Yet 

♦ Report of the minister Garelli, laid before the Cortes^ 
1st of March, 1822. 
L 2 



150 

ihe scandal of defection is guarded against by 
fears that would crush stouter hearts, and distract 
less vivid imaginations, than those of timid and 
sensitive females. Even a temporary leave to 
quit the convent for the restoration of decaying 
health is seldom given, and never applied for but 
by such nuns as unhappiness drives into a dis- 
regard of public opinion. I saw my eldest sister, 
at the age of two-and-twenty, slowly sink into the 
grave within the walls of a convent; whereas, 
had she not been a slave to that church which 
has been a curse to me; air, amusement, and 
exercise might have saved her. I saw her on her 
deathbed. I obtained that melancholy sight at 
the risk of bursting my heart, when, in my ca- 
pacity of priest, and at her own request, I heard 
her last confession. Ah! when shall I forget 
the mortal agony with which, not to disturb the 
dying moments of that truly angelic being, I sup- 
pressed my gushing tears in her presence; the 
choking sensation with which I forced the words 
of absolution through my convulsed lips; the 
faltering steps with which I left the convent 
alone, making the solitary street where it stood 
re-echo the sobs I could no longer contain! 



151 

I saw my dear sister no more; but another was 
left me, if not equal in talents to the eldest (for 
I have known few that could be considered her 
equals), amiable and good in no inferior degree. 
To her I looked up as a companion for life. But 
she had a heart open to every noble impression — 
and such, among Catholics, are apt to be misled 
from the path of practical usefulness, into the 
wilderness of visionary perfection. At the age 
of twenty she left an infirm mother to the care of 
servants and strangers, and shut herself up in a 
convent, where she was not allowad. to see even 
the nearest relations. With a delicate frame, 
requiring every indulgence to support it in health, 
she embraced a rule which denied her the com- 
forts of the lowest class of society. A coarse 
woollen frock fretted her skin; her feet had no 
covering but that of shoes open at the toes, that 
they might expose them to the cold of a brick 
floor; a couch of bare planks was her bed, and an 
unfurnished cell her dwelling. Disease soon 
filled her conscience with fears; and I had often 
to endure the torture of witnessing her agonies 
at the confessional. I left her, when I quitted 
Spain, dying much too slowly for her only chance 



153 



of relief. I wept bitterly for her loss two years 
afterj yet I could not be so cruel as to wish her 
alive* 



LETTER VL 

Romey the enemy of mental improvement: the direct 
tendencij of her Prayer-book^ the Breviary, to 
cherish credulity and adulterate Christian virtue. 

I COULD not connect the subject of my prece- 
ding Letter with any other, without doing the 
greatest violence to the overpowering feelings 
which the recollection of celibacy and monachism, 
never fail to raise in me. I now proceed to show 
the natural opposition which exist between the 
spiritual power assumed by the church of Rome^ 
and the improvement of the human understand- 
ing. After this, I shall close my subject with 
numerous proofs of her disregard of truth, in the 
dissemination of a timid, superstitious, and cre- 
dulous spirit, the best security of her influence 
among mankind. 

The long list of illustrious writers, members 
of the Roman Catholic communion, with which 
the first part of my charge will be met, is well 
known to me. I would allow that list to be 



154 

doubled: I would grant every one of your boasted 
authors the whole weight of learning and abili- 
ties which you allot to them by your own scale 
of merit; yet it would remain to be proved, that 
vigour of mind and comprehensiveness of knowl- 
edge were, in such instances, attained in accord- 
ance with the influence of the Roman Catholic 
Church, and not, as I am ready to show, in the 
very teeth of its spirit. The resources of the 
human mind, when once in motion after knowl- 
edge, are innumerable. Fear and resti'aint may 
force it into devious and crooked paths, but not 
without injury to its moral qualities; but no 
power on earth can prevent the exertion of its 
activity. 

It is curious to observe the invariable accura- 
cy with which certain principles, true or false, 
will work; and how perfectly analogous their ef- 
fects will be when applied to the most different 
objects. We see the assumption of supernatural 
infallibility, gradually leading the Popes to at- 
tempt the subjection of all Christian powers. A 
criminal ambition might often mix in their po- 
litical plans and views; but the impulse which 
threatened the thrones of Europe, was indepen- 



155 

dent of the individual temper of the popes. The 
mildest, humblest individual, believing himself 
an infallible guide to salvation, must have consi- 
dered the removal of every obstacle to that 
paramount object, a part, not only of his pri- 
vilege, but his duty. He would, therefore, 
strive to reduce all human power, so as to suit 
his views of spiritual rule. The declaration that 
Christ's kingdom is not of this world, would not 
prevent a conscientious Pope from checking any 
temporal power, which he conceived to oppose 
the interests of the next. On the same grounds, 
and from the very same principle, has Rome been, 
at all times, the declared enemy of mental inde- 
pendence. She, it is true, confines her open 
claims, in this case, to i)oints of Christian faith, 
as to spiritual supremacy in the former. But re- 
move opposition in both, and you will see her 
become as great a tyrant over the human intel- 
lect, as she was at one time over the governments 
of Christendom. There is, in fact, a greater 
connexion between the learned and scientific 
opinions of men and their religious tenets, than 
between moral practice and civil allegiance. — 
Hence, the rights of the Roman Catholic church 



156 

to prescribe limits to the mind are still openly 
contended for, while the indirect dominion of the 
popes over Christian kings and their people, is 
only timidly whispered within the walls of the 
Vatican. 

But how does it happen that Italy and France 
have produced men of extraordinary eminence, 
notwithstanding their mental subjection to Rome? 
— I might answer this question by another: How 
is it that the talent of Spain and Portugal has 
been rendered aboi'tiAC? — The tendency of moral 
as well as pliysical agents must be estimated, not 
by tliat which they fail to affect, but by the con- 
dition of what is faii'ly submitted to their action. 
Will you have an adequate notion of the fetters 
laid by Rome upon the human mind? examine the 
intellect of such as wear them really, not osten- 
sibly. Would you ascertain the true practical 
consequences of any law? observe its results, 
where it is not eluded. The Roman Catholic re- 
straints on the understanding, have been and are 
still actively enforced in Spain; whereas the 
weakness of the papal government has never 
been able to put the Italian inquisitions into fiill 
activity. France was always free from that 



157 

scourge; and the confinement of a few authors to 
the Bastille, was a poor substitute for the Autos- 
da-Fe of tlie unfortunate Spanish Peninsula. 

But has not the influence of Roman Catholic 
infallibility, even in those less oppressed coun- 
tries, disturbed the best efforts of the human in- 
tellect, closed up many of the direct roads to 
knowledge, and forced ingenuity to skulk in the 
pursuit of it like a thief? Sound the antiquari- 
an, the astronomer, the natural philosopher of 
Italy; and the characteristic shrug of their shoul- 
ders Avill soon tell you that tliey have gone the full 
stretch of the chain they are forced to wear. — 
W hat if the chain be already snapt at every link, 
and kept together by threads? Reckon, if you 
can, the struggles, the sighs, the artifices, the 
perjuries which have brought it to that state. — 
Look at Galileo on his knees: see the commenta- 
tors of Newton prefixing a declai'ation to his im- 
mortal Prindpia^ in which, by a solemn false- 
hood, they avoid the fate of the unhappy Floren- 
tine astronomer. < ^Newton, ^' say the great ma- 
thematicians, Le Seur and Jacquier, assumes, in 
his thii'd book, the hypothesis of the eartli's mo- 
tion. The propositions of that author could not 



158 

be explained except through the same hypothe- 
sis- We have, therefore, been forced to act a 
character not our own. But we declare our sub- 
mission to the decrees of the Roman Pontiffs 
against the motion of the earth/^^ The samje 
sacrifice of sincerity is required at the Spanish 
universities. Science, indeed, has scarcely ever 
made a step without bowing, with a lie in her 
mouth, to Roman infallibility. Mankind has to 
thank Lord Bacon, as he might thank the intel- 
lectual liberty which the Reformation allowed 
him, for that burst of light which at once broke 
out from his writings, and spread the seeds of 
true knowledge, too thick and wide for Rome to 
smother them. She had been able, at former 
periods, to decide the fate of philosophical sys- 
tems according as they appeared to favour or op- 
pose her notions. In this case, however, she was 
both unable to perceive the extent of her danger, 

* Newtoaus,, in hoc tertio libro, tellurls inotac hypothesira 
assumit. Autoris propositiones aliter explicari non poterant, 
nisi eadem quoque facta hypothesi. Hinc alienam coacti 
sumus gerere personam. Caeterum latis a summis pontifici- 
bus contra telluris motum decretis, nos obsequi profitemur. — 
Newtoni Principia, vol. III. Colonix Allobrogum, 176Q, — 
This declarRtion was made in 1742. 



159 

and to check the simultaneous impulse of the 
awakened mind of Europe. The Council of 
Trent, however, had, a short time before, done 
every thing in its power, to keep mankind in 
subjection to the church upon every branch of 
knowledge. By a solemn decree of that Coun- 
cil, the press was subjected to the previous cen- 
sure of the bishops or the inquisitors in every 
part of Christendom. It is not difficult to con- 
ceive the use which these holy umpires of knowl- 
edge, would make of their autliority to check and 
subdue the petulent minds^^ who dared to broach 
any thing which jarred with the principles of 
school philosophy or divinity. But we need not 
leave this to conjecture: the censures attached 
to the long list of books condemned in the Index 
Expurgatorms of Rome, accurately describe the 
extent of intellectual freedom, which Rome grants 
to the faithful subjects of her spiritual empire. 

The fact that both popes and bishops of the 
Roman Catholic communion have often patroniz- 
ed knowledge, is anxiously brought forward to 

* Ad coercenda petulantia ingenia, — The Council of Trent 
confirmed the decree of the Council of Lateran, which exr 
tends the censure to all kinds of books. 



160 

prove the existence of a liberal and enlightened 
spirit in the Roman church. Now, if tlie conduct 
of individuals were admitted as a criterion of the 
temper of their church, it would be easy to pro- 
duce thousands who have opposed real knowledge 
for every one that has promoted its interests.^ — 
Besides, a pope may be a patron of the fine arts, 
and a determined enemy to philosophical studies. 
A cardinal or a bishop may spend his savings 
and fortune in the erection of a college, witli a 
view to perpetuate the metaphysics of the thir- 
teenth century. Such will be found to be the bene- 
factions which learning has generally received 
from the members of the church of Rome. It is 
true we owe the preservation of manuscripts to 
the monks, though it would be difficult to enume- 
rate the multitude of works which were destroy- 
ed by their sloth and ignorance. The public 
schools of Europe were endowed by the liberali- 
ty of Roman Catholics; but if either those that 
preserved the treasures of ancient literature, or 
those who founded our universities, had suspect- 
ed the dii'ection which the human mind would 

* Note K. 



16| 

take from the excitement of these mental stimuli; 
they would have doomed poets, orators, and phi- 
losophers to the flames, and flung their endowing 
nicney into the sea. I do not blame individuals 
for partaking the spirit of their age, hut protest 
against a church which, having attained the ful- 
ness of strength under the influence of the most 
ignorant ages, would, for the sake of that 
strength, stop the progress of time, and reduce 
the nineteenth century to the intellectual stand- 
ard of the thirteenth.^ Moral as well as physi- 
cal beings must love their native atmosphere; and 
Rome being no exception to this law> is still dai- 
ly employed in renovating and spreading credu- 
lity, enthusiasm, and superstition — ^the elements 
in which she thrives. The charge is strong, and 
expressed in strong language; but, I believe, not 
stronger than the following proofs will warrant. 



* The inveterate enmity of a sincere Roman Catholic 
against books which directly or indirectly dissent from his 
church, is unconquerable. There is a family in E?) gland 
who having inherited a copious library under circumstances 
which make it a kind of heir-loom, have torn out every leaf 
of the Protestant works, leaving nothing in the shelves but 
the covers. This fact I know from the most unquestionable 
authority. 

M 2 



162 

A Christian church cannot employ a more 
effectual instrument to fashion and mould the 
minds of her members, than the form of prayer 
and worship which she sanctions for daily use. — 
Such is the Breviary or Prayer-book of the Ro- 
man Catholic clergy, which, as it stands in the 
present day, is the most authentic w^ork of that 
kind. In consequence of a decree of the Council 
of Trent, Pope Pius V. ordered a number of 
learned and able men to compile the Breviary and 
by his bull, ^uod a nobisy July, 1566, sanctioned 
it, and commanded the use thereof to the clergy 
of the Roman Catholic church, all over the world. 
Clement VIII., in 1602, finding that the Brevia- 
ry of Pius V. had been altered and depraved; 
restored it to its pristine state, and ordered, 
under pain of excommunication, that all future 
editions should strictly follow that which he then 
printed at the Vatican. Lastly, Urban VIII., 
in 1631, had the language of the whole work, 
and the metres of the hymns revised. The value 
which the church of Rome sets upon the Brevia- 
ry, may be known from the strictness witli which 
she demands the perusal of it. Whoever enjoys 
any ecclesiastical revenue; all persons of both 



163 

sexes who have professed in any of the regular or- 
ders;=^ all sub -deacons, deacons and priests, are 
bound to repeat, either in public or private, the 
whole service of the day, out of the Breviary. The 
omission of any one of the eight portions of which 
that service consists, is declared to be a mortal 
sin, i. e. a sin that, unrepented, would be suffi- 
cient to exclude from salvation. The person 
guilty of such an omission, loses all legal right 
to whatever portion of his clerical emoluments 
is due for the day or days wherein he neglected 
that duty, and cannot be absolved till he has giv- 
en the forfeited sums to the poor, or redeemed 
the greatest part by a certain donation to the 
Spanish crusade. Such are the sanctions and 
penalties by which the reading of the Breviary is 
enforced. The scrupulous exactness with which 
this duty is performed by all who have not se- 
cretly cast off their spiritual allegiance, is quite 
surprising. For more than twelve years of my 
life, at a period when my university studies re- 

* Some orders have a peculiar Breviary, with the appro* 
bation of the pope. There is no substantial difference be* 
tween these monkish Prayer-books and the JBreviart^f which 
is used by the great body of Romau CathuUc clergy. 



161 

qtiired uninterrupted attention, I believed myself 
bound to repeat the appointed prayers and les- 
sons: a task whicli, in spite of a rapid enuncia- 
tion, took up an hour and a half daily. A dispen- 
sation of tliis duty is not to be obtained from 
Rome without the utmost difficulty.^ I never, 
indeed, knew or heard of any one who had ob- 
tained it. 

The Breviary, therefore, must be reckoned the 
true standard to which the church of Rome wish- 
es to reduce the minds and hearts of her clergyy 
from the highest dignitary to the most obscure 
priest. It is in the Breviary that we may be sure 
to find the full extent of the pious belief, to which 
she trains the pastors of her flock; and the true 
Stamp of those virtues which she boasts of in her 
models of Christian perfection. By making the 
daily repetition of the Breviary a paramount du- 
ty of the clergy, Rome evidently gives it the 

* Among the many charges made in the name of the Pope 
by Cardinal Gonsalvi, against Baron von Wessenberg, Vicar 
General of Constance, is that he had granted dispensations 
of this kind, to many clergymen in his diocess. This curi- 
ous correspondence was published in London, by Acker- 
mann, in 1819. It deserves the attention of such as wish to 
ascertain the temper of the court of Rome in our own days,. 



165 

preference over all other works; and as far as 
she is concerned, provided the appointed teachers 
of her laity read her own hook, they may troiihle 
themselves very little about others. Nay, should 
a Roman Catholic clergyman, as is often the case, 
be unable to devote more than an hd^ir and a half 
a day, to reading; his church places him under 
the necessity of deriving his whole knowledge 
from the Breviary. 

Precious, indeed, must be the contents of that 
privileged volume, if we trust the authority which 
so decidedly enforces its perusal. There was a 
time when I knew it by heart; but long neglect 
of that store of knowledge, had lately left but 
faint traces of the most exquisite passages con- 
tained therein. The present occasion, however, 
has forced me to take my old task-book in hand; 
and it shall now be my endeavour to arrange and 
condense the copious extracts made in my last 
revision. 

The office of the Roman Catholic church was 
originally so contrived as to divide the Psaltery 
between the seven days of the week. Portions of 
the Old Scriptures were also read alternately with 
extracts from the legends of the saints, and the 



166 

works of the fathers. But as the calendar be- 
came crowded with saints, whose festivals take 
precedence of the regular church service; little 
room is left for any thing but a few psalms, 
which are constantly repeated, a very small part 
of the Old Testament, and mere fragments of the 
Gospels and Epistles. The great and never-end- 
ing variety consists in the compendious lives of 
the saints, of which I will here give some speci- 
mens. 

In the first place, I shall speak of the early 
martyrs, the spurious records of whose sufferings 
have been made to contribute most copiously to 
the composition of the Breviary. The variety 
and ingenuity of the tortures described, are 
only equalled by the innumerable miracles which 
baffled the tyrants, whenever they attempted to 
injure the Christians by any method but cutting 
their throats. Houses were set on fire to burn 
the martyrs within; but the Breviary informs us 
that the flames raged for a whole day and a night 
without molesting them. Often do we hear of 
idols tumbling from their pedestals at the approach 
of the persecuted Christians; and even the judges 
themselves dropt dead when they attempted to 



167 

pass sentence. The wild beasts seldom devour 
a martyr without prostrating themselves before 
him; and lions follow young virgins to protect 
them from insult. The sea refuses to drown those 
who are committed to its waters; and when com- 
pelled to do that odious service, the waves general- 
ly convey the dead bodies where the Christians 
may preserve them as relics. On one occasion a 
pope is thrown into the Lake Moeotis, with an 
anchor which the cautious infidels had tied round 
his neck, for fear of the usual miraculous floating: 
the plan succeeded, and the pope was drowned. 
But the sea was soon after observed to recede 
three miles from the shore, where a temple appear- 
ed, in which the body of the martyr had been pro- 
vided with a marble sarcophagus. =^ 

* "Clemens.. ..a Trajano imperatore releg*atus est trans 
Mare Ponticum in solitudinem urbis Chersonx, in qua duo 
millia Christianorura reperit. .qui cum in eruendis et secandis 
marmoribus aquae penuria laborarent, Clemens facta orationei 
in vicinum collem ascendit; in cujus jugo vidit Agnum dextro 
pede fontem aquae dulcls, qui inde scaturiebat attingentem, 
ubi omnes sitim expleverunt; eoque miraculo multi infideles 
ad Christi fidem conversi, dementis etiam sanctitatem vene- 
rare coeperunt: quibus concitatus Trajanus, misit illuc qui 
Clementem, alligata ad ejus collum anchora, in profundum de- 
jicerent, Quod cum factum esset, Chfistianis ad littus 



168 

There is a good deal of romantic interest in the 
history of Cyprian and Justina. The former be- 
ing a heathen majician, who to that detestable art 
joined a still more infamous occupation; engaged 
to put a young man in possession of Justina, a 
Christian virgin. For this purpose he employed 
the most potent incantations, till the devil was 
forced to confess that he had no power over Chris- 
tians. Upon this, Cypi^an very sensibly conclu- 
ded, that it w as better to be a Christian than a 
sorcerer. The readers of romance may, after 
this, expect every sort of incident except a mar- 
riage, which none but inferior saints ever con- 
tract; and from which all must extricate them- 
selves before they can be in a fair way of obtain- 
ing a place in the calender. Cyprian and Justina 
being accused before the Roman judge, are, 
Jiowever, fried together, in a caldron of melted 
*^pitch, fat, and wax,'' from which they come 
out quite able to be carried to Nicomedia, where 
they are put to death by the almost infallible 



orantibus, mare ad tria milliaria recessit; eoque illi acce- 
dentes, acdiculam marmoream in templi formam, etintusarcam 
lapideam, ubi Marty ris corpus conditum erat, et, juxta illud, 
anchoram qua mersus fuerat, invenerunt," 



169 

means of the sword or the axe. I say almost^ 
because I find an instance where even this method 
had nearly disappointed the persecutors. That 
happened in the case of St. Cecilia. This saint, 
of musical celebrity, having been forced to marry 
a certain Valerius, cautioned most earnestly her 
bridegroom to avert from himself the vengeance 
of an angel who had the charge of her purity. 
The good-natured Valerius agreed to forego his 
rights, provided he was allowed to see his heaven- 
ly rival; and for this purpose submitted to be bap- 
tized. After the ceremony the angel showed 
himself to Valerius, and subsequently to a brother 
of his, who had been let into the secret. This 
JDecilia is the martyr on whom, as I mention- 
ed before, a whole house flaming about her for 
a natural day, had not the smallest effect. Even 
when the axe was employed, the lictor exerted 
his strength in vain on the delicate neck of his 
victim,, which being but half divided, yet allowed 
her miraculously to live for three days more, at 
the end of which she faii'ly died.^ 

* "Cyprianus primum magus, postea martyr cum Justinam 
Christianum virginem, quam juvenis quidem ardenter amabat, 
cantionibus ac veneficiis add ejus libidinis assensum allicere 
CDnaretur, dsemonem consuluit, quanam id re consequi posset* 



170 

After the romantic miracles of the early mar- 
tyrs, I have to mention the stories by which the 

Cui daemon respondit, nullam illi artem processuram adversus 
eos, qui vere Christum colerent. Quo response conmotus Cy- 
prianus, vehementer dolere coepit vitae superioris institutura. 
Itaque relictis mag-icis artibus, se totum ad C:hristi domini 
fidem convertit. Quam ob causam una cum virgine Justina 
comprehensus est, et ambo colaphis flagellisque caesi, moxin 

carcerem conjecti in sartaginem plenam ferventis picis, 

adipis et cerx injecti sunt. Demum Nicomediae securi feri- 
untur. 

"Caecilia virgo Romana, nobili genere nata, a prima setate 
Christians fidei praeceptis instituta, virginitatem suam Deo 
vovit. Sed cum postea contra suam voluntatem data esset in 
matrimonium Valeriano, prima nuptiarum nocte hunc cum eo 
sermonem habuit: Ego Valeriana, in Angeli tutela sum, qui 
virginitatem meum custodit: quare ne quid in me committas, 
quo ira Dei in te concitetur. Quibus verbis commotus 
Valerianus, illam attingere non est ausus: quin etiam addidit, 
se in Christum crediturum, si eum Angelum videret. Cui* 
Caecilia cum sine baptismo negaret id fieri posse, incensus 
cupiditate videndi Angelum, se baptizari velle respondet..., 
(Baptizatus, et) ad Caeciliam re versus, orantem et cum ea 
Angelum divino splendore fulgentem, invenit. Quoaspectu 
obstupefactus, ut primum ex timore confirmatus est, Tibur- 
tium f'ratrem suum accersit qui a Caecilia Christi fide imbutus 

ipse etiam ejusdem Angeli quern frater ejus viderat, as- 

pectu dignatus est. Uterque autem paulo post Almachi* 
Prxfecto, constant er martyrium subit. Qui mox Caeciliam 
comprehendi imperat....eamque in ipsius aedes reductam, in 
balneo comhuvijussit. Quo in loco cum diem noctemque it* 
fuisset, ut ne flamma quidem illam attingeret; eo immissus 
est carnifex, qui ter securi ictam, cum caput abscLndere noa 
potuisset, semivivatn reliquit> &c» &c/* 



171 

Bre^'iary endeavours to support the extravagant 
veneration for the Popes and their see, which 
at all times has been the leading aim of the Ro- 
man court. The most notorious forgeries are, 
for this purpose, sanctioned and consecrated in 
her Prayer-book. That these legends are often 
given in the words of those whom the church of 
Rome cMsfatherSy shows the weakness both of the 
Popish structure, and of the props that support 
it. We thus find the fable about the contest be- 
tween St. Peter and Simon Magus, before Nero, 
gravely repeated in the words of St. Maximus. 
^*The holy apostles (Peter and Paul) lost their 
lives, he says, because, among other miracles, 
they also, by their prayers, precipitated Simon 
from the vacuity of the air. For Simon calling 
himself Christ, and engaging to ascend to the 
Father, was suddenly raised in flight, by means 
of his majic art. At this moment Peter, bend- 
ing his knees, prayed to the Lord, and by his 
holy prayer defeated the magician^s lightness; for 
the prayer reached the Lord sooner than the 
flight,' the right petition outstripped the unjust 
presumption. Peter, on earth, obtained what he 
asked, much before Simon could reach the hea- 



irs 

iFens to which he was making his way. Peter, 
therefore, brought down his rival from the air as 
if he had held him by a rope, and dashing him 
against a stone, in a precipice, broke his legs : 
doing this in scorn of the fact itself, so that he 
who but a moment before, had attempted to fly, 
should not now be able to walk; and having affect- 
ed wings,* should want the use of his heels. ''^ 

The use which the Breviary makes of the 
forged epistles of the early Popes, known by the 
name of false Decretals, is frequently obvious to 
those who are acquainted with both. As these 

* "Hodierna ig-itur die beati Apostoli sanguinem profude- 
runt. Sed videamus causam quare ista perpessi sunt; scilicet, 
quod inter cetera mirabilia etiam magum ilium SimoneA 
orationibus suis de aeris vacuo praecipiti ruina prostraverunt* 
Cum enim idem Simon se Christum dicerit, et tanquamfilium 
ad patrem assereret volando se posse conscendere, atque ela- 
tus subito magicis artibus volare coepisset; tunc Petrus fixis 
genibus precatus est Dominum, et precatione sancta vicit 
magicam levitatem. Prior enim ascendit ad Dominum oratio 
quam volatus; et ante pervenit justa petitio, quam iniqua prsc- 
sumptio: ante Petrus in terris positus obtinuit quod petebat, 
quam Simon perveniret in coelestibus, quo tendebat. Tunc 
igitur Petrus velut vinctum ilium de sublimi acre deposuit, 
et quodam prxcipitio in saxo elidens, ejus crura confregit; et 
hoc in opprobrio facti illius, ut qui paulo ante volare ten- 
taverat, subito ambulare non posset; et qui pennas assump» 
serat, plantas amitteret.'* Septima die infra Octavam S?i 
Apost. Petri et Pauli. 



173 

Decretals were forged about the eighth century, 
with a view to magnify the power of the Roman 
see, nothing in their contents is more prominent 
than that object. The Breviary, therefore, never 
omits an opportunity ofestablishing the Papal su- 
premacy by tacit reference to these spurious docu- 
ments. Yet as this would have but a slight 
effect upon the mass of the faithful, a more pic- 
turesque story is related in the life of Pope SU 
John. 

His Holiness being on a journey to Corinth^ 
and in want of a quiet and comfortable horse^ 
borrowed one, which the lady of a certain noble- 
man used to ride. The animal carried the Pope 
with the greatest ease and docility: and, when 
the journey was over, was returned to his mis- 
tress,- but in vain did she attempt to enjoy the 
accustomed services of her favourite. The horse 
had become fierce, and gave the lady many an 
unseemly fall: ^^as if (says the authorized record) 
feeling indignant at having to carry a woman, 
since the Vicar of Christ had been on his back.^^=^ 

* **Cum ei nob ills vir ad Corinthunn, equum, quo ejus uxor 
mansueto utebatur, itineris causa commodasset; factum est 
u^ Domino postea remissus equus ita ferox evaderet, ut fpe» 

N £ 



174 

The horse was accordingly presented to the Pope,, 
as unfit to be ridden by a less dignified person- 
age. 

The standing miracles of the city of Rome; those 
miraculous relics which even at this moment 
are drawing crowds of pilgrims within its walls, 
and which, in former times, made the whole of 
Europe support the idleness of the Romans at the 
expense of their devout curiosity; are not over- 
looked in the Prayer-book of her church. Let me 
mention the account it gives of St. Peter's chains, 
such as they are now venerated at Rome. Eu- 
doxia, the wife of Theodosius the younger, being 

mitu, et totius corporis agitatlone, semper deinceps dominam 
expulerit: tanquam indignaretur mulieretn recipere ex quo 
sedisset in eo Christi vicarius.'* Brev. Rom. die 27 Maii. 

The Breviaiy, true to its plan of giving the substance of 
every story that ever sprang from the fertile imagination of 
the idle monks, concludes the life by stating the vision of a 
certain hermit, who saw the soul of Theodoric the Goth; 
carried to hell by Pope John and Symmachus, through one 
>of the volcanos of the Lipari Islands. "Paulo post moritur 
Theodoricus: quem quidam eremita, ut scribit Sanctus 
Gregorius, vidit inter Joannem Pontificem, et Symmachum 
Patricium, quem idem occiderat, demergi in igTiem Liparita" 
num." — This legend (says Gibbon) is related by Gregory I. 
and approved by Baronius; and both the Pope and Cardinal 
are grave doctors, sufficient to establish a probable opinion.** 
Chap, xxxix. Note 108. 



175 

on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, received as a pre* 
sent the chain with which St. Peter was bound 
in prison, when he was liberated by an angel. 
This chain, set with jewels, was forwai*ded by the 
pious empress to her daughter, then at Rome. 
The young princess, rejoiced with the gift, showed 
the chain to the Pope, who repaid the compli- 
ment by exhibiting another chain, which the holy 
apostle had borne under Nero. As, to compare 
their structure, the two chains were brought into 
contact, the links at the extremities of each joined 
together, and the two pieces became one uniform 
chain. =^ 

After these samples, no one will be surprised 
to find in the same authorized record, all the other 
supposed miracles which, in different parts of 
Italy, move daily the enlightened traveller to 
laughter or disgust. The translation of the house 
of Loretto from Palestine to the Papal States, is 

• "Cum igitur Pontifex Romanam catenam cum ea, quae 
lerosolymis allata fuerat, contulisset, factum est, ut illae 
inter se sic connecterentur ut non dux sed una catena ab 
eodem artifice confecta, esse videretur.*' In Festo St. Petri 
ad Vincula. The present Pope mentions this chain as one of 
the inducements for the faithful to visit Rome this year of 
Jubilee. See the translation of the Proclamation, Note L, 



176 

asserted in the collect for that festival; which be- 
ing a direct address to the Deity, cannot he sup^ 
posed to have been carelessly compiled.^ The 
two removals of that house by the hands of an- 
gels, first to the coast of Dalmatia, and thence, 
over the Adriatic, to the opposite shore, are 
gravely related in the Lessons; where the mem- 
bers of the Roman Catholic church are reminded 
that the identity of the house is warranted by 
papal bulls, and a proper mass and service pub- 
lished by the same authority for the annual com- 
memoration of that event. 

* "Deus, qui beatse MaricC Virginls domum per incarnati 
Verbi mysterium misericorditer consecrasti, eamque in sinu 
ecclesia tuse mlrabiliter collocastl,*'' &c. &c. The account of 
the pretended miraculous conveyance of the house by the 
hands of the ang-els is given in the lessons: "Ipsius autem 
Tirginis natalis domus divinis mysteriis consecrata, Angelo- 
rum ministerio ab Infidelium potestate, in Dalmatiam prius, 
deinde in Agrum Lauretanum Picenae Provincise translata 
fuit, sedente sancto Coelestino quinto: eandemque ipsam esse 
in qua Verbum caro factum est, et habitavit in nobis, turn 
Pontificis diplomatibus, et celeberrima totius Orbis venera- 
tione, turn continua miraculorum virtute, et coelestium bene- 
ficiorum gratia, comprobatur. Quibus permotus Innocentius 
Duodecimus, quo ferventius erga Matris amantissimae cultum 
Fidelium memoria excitaretur, ejusdem Sanctae Domus 
Translationem anniversaria solemnitate in totaPiceni Provin- 
cia veneratam, Missa etiam et Officio proprio celebrari prx- 
cepit/* 



It is rather curious to observe the difference in 
the assertion of Italian and of French miracles: 
the unhesitating confidence with which the for- 
mer are stated, the hypercritical jealousy which 
appears in the narrative of the latter. The walk 
of St. Dionysius, with his own head in his hands, 
from Paris to the site of the present abbey of St. ^ 
Denis, is given only as a credible report. ^'De 
quo illud memoriae proditum esty abscissum suum 
caput sustulisse, et progressum ad duo millia 
passuum in manibus gestasse.^^^^ The French, 
indeed, with their liberties of the Gallican church, 
have never been favourites at Rome; but all is 
certainty in the accounts of Italian worthies.-— 
Witness the renowned St. Januarius, whose e^x- 
traordinary miracles, both during his life under 
Diocletian, and in our own days, are stated with 
equal confidence and precision. The Saint, we 
are told, being thrown into a burning furnace, 
came out so perfectly unhurt, that not even his 

• The Breviary, however, does not betray such hesitation 
as to the works of the said Dionysius, the Areopagite — the 
most barefaced forgery which ever was foisted on the credu- 
lity of the world. Libros scripsit admirabiles, ac plane coeleS' 
tes^ de divinis nominibus, de calesti et Ecclesiastica Hierarchia^ 
de mystica Theologian et alios quosdam. 



179 

clotlies or hair were singed. The next day all 
the wild beasts in the amphitheatre came crouch- 
ing to his feet. I pass over the other ancient 
performances of Januariiis, to show the style in 
which his wonderful works, after death, are giv- 
en. His body, for instance, on one occasion, ex- 
tinguished the flames of Vesuvius.^ This is no 
miracle upon vague report, but one which, ac- 
cording to the Breviary, deserves a peculiar re- 
membrance. Next comes that ^^noble miracle'' — 
prsedarum ilhid — ^the liquefaction of Januarius's 
blood, which takes place every year at Naples. 
The usual state of the blood, as a coagulated 
mass, and its change into a bubbling fluid, are 
circumstantially described, as might be expected, 
from historians, who convey the most minute in- 



* "In ardentem fomacem conjectus ita illaesus evasit ut nc 
Testimentum aiit capillum quidem flamma violaverit. (Ferse) 
Naturalis feritatis oblitae, ad Januarii pedes se prostravere. — 
In primis memorandum quod erampentes olim e monte 
Vesuvio flammarum g-lobos, nee vicinis modo, sed long'mquis 
etiam regionibus vastitatis metum afferentes, extinxit. — 
Praeclarum illud quoque, quod ejus sang-uis, qui in ampulla 
vitrea concretusasservatur, cum in conspeclu capitis ejusdem 
martyris ponitur, admirandum in modum colliquefieri, et 
ebullire, perinde atque recens effusus, ad haec usque tempo- 
ra cernitur." 



i79 

formation, even about the clothes and hair of a 
martyr that died fifteen hundred years ago. The 
liquefaction, indeed, with all its circumstances, 
they must have witnessed themselves, or derived 
their information concerning it from thousands 
of Neapolitan witnesses. 

And here let me observe by the w ay, the ex- 
traordinary liberality of his church upon these 
points, which Mr. Butler sets forth to the admi- 
ration of the world. ^^A person," he tells us, 
^^may disbelieve every other miracle (except those 
which are related in the Old or the New Testa- 
ment,) and may even disbelieve the existence of 
the persons through w hose intercession they are 
related to have been wrought, w ithout ceasing ta 
be a Roman Catholic.''* We must, however, 
exempt from this very ample privilege those whd 
thus solemnly publish the miracles themselves, or 
their honesty would certainly be placed in a 
strange predicament. Still, by a stronger rea- 
son, we must suppose them perfectly convinced of 
the reality of that annual wonder, which for ages 
has been repeated under their eyes. How , then, 

• Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p. 4^ 



180 

can they be so insensible to the forlorn condition 
of heretics and unbelievers, as not to allow a 
close inspection of that undeniable proof of the 
Roman C atholic faith ? The present Pope invites 
us to see the manger where the infant Saviour lay 
at Bethlehem. Would it not be more charitable 
to allow one of our chemists to view the blood of 
St. Januarius, and observe its change — not sur- 
rounded by priests, candles, and the smoke of 
frankincense, — and thus convert us all at one 
stroke? 

The world is full of Roman Catholic miracles, 
in the incorrupt bodies of saints, which lie on the 
altars, inclosed in gold and silver cases. I have 
often performed high mass before that of St. 
Ferdinand, which is preserved in the royal chapel 
at Seville; and, though a member of the chapter 
to whose charge the Spanish kings have intrust- 
ed their holy ancestor, I could never obtain a dis- 
tinct view of the body, which the church of Rome 
declares to be incorrupt.^ On certain days the 
front of a massive silver sarcophagus is removed, 

* "Jacet ejus corpus incorruptum adhuc post quatuor saecu* 
la in templo maximo Hispalensi, honorificentissimo inclusum 
sepulchro.** Breviarum Rom. in festo Sancti Ferdinandi. 



181 

when a gold and glass chest is seen, containing 
something like a man covered with splendid robes. 
But the multitude of candles on the altar, and 
the want of light from behind, prevent a distinct 
view of the objects within- Once, when the mul- 
titude was thronging the chapel, a lady of high 
rank, who had applied to me for a closer view 
than was allowed to the crowd, was furnished 
with a stool to stand upon a level with the body. 
To gratify at once her and my own curiosity, I 
took a candle from the altar, and endeavoured to 
counteract the reflection of the glass, by throwing 
in the light obliquely. One of our inferior cler- 
gy, the sacristan, whose duty it was to stand 
near the saint in his surplice, seeing what I was 
about, snatched the candle from my hand, with a 
rudeness which nothing but his half roguish, half 
holy zeal, could have prompted. He pretended 
to be alarmed for the pane of glass; but I more 
than suspect that he knew the incorruptibility of 
the saint could not bear inspection. The head^ 
which I distinctly saw, was a mere skull, with 
something like painted parchment holding up the 
lewer jaw. A similar covering seems to have 
O 



183 

been laid on the right foot, which projects out of 
the royal robes. 

When the greatest miracle of Christianity, the 
resurrection of Christ, was performed for the con- 
version of men to the gospel, the Saviour himself 
offered the marks of his wounds to the close in- 
spection of a doubting disciple. The church of 
Rome follows a different plan in the use of the 
multiplied miracles of which she boasts. She has 
no compassion for men who w ill credit only theii' 
sight and touch. 

Historical miracles are safe from this ti'ouble- 
some curiosity; and to these I must return after 
my digression. Let us take a few specimens from 
those of the early ages of monachism. Among 
these hardly any narrative will be found more 
curious than that which the Breviary copies from 
Saint Jerome, as a record of the life of Paul, the 
first Hermit. Paul, we are told, retired to a cave 
in the desert parts of the Thebais, where he lived 
from early youth to the age of one hundred and 
ten. Being near his death, Anthony, another 
Egyptian Anchorite, paid him a visit by a super- 
natural command from heaven. Their nameg 
being, in the same manner, revealed to each other, 



183 

rhey met, for the first time, with the familiarity 
of old acquaintance. W'hile they were talking 
ahout spiritual matters, a raven dropped a loaf of 
bread at the feet of Paul. ^ ^Thanks be to heaven," 
exclaimed the father of hermits; ^^it is now sixty 
years since I received half a loaf daily in this 
manner: to-day my allowance has been doubled.*^ 
On the morrow Paul requested his friend Anthony 
to return for a cloak, which, having belonged to 
Saint Athanasius, he wished to have as his wind- 
ing-sheets Anthony was combig back with the 
cloak, when he saw the soul of Paul going up 
into heaven surrounded by the holy company of 
the prophets and apostles. In the cave he found 
the corpse with crossed legs, erected head, and 
the arms raised above it. He was, however, at a 
loss how to dig a grave, being also an old man of 
ninety, and having no spade or any instrument of 
that kind. In this distress he saw two lions 
hurrying towards him from the interior of the 
desert. The lions, in the best manner they could, 
gave him to understand that they meant him no 
harm, but, on the contrary, were much affected 
by the death of Paul. They then set to work 
with their claws, and having made a hole of suf- 



184- 

iicient size to contain the dead body, quietly and 
decently retired to their fastnesses. Anthony took 
possession of PauPs coat, which was made of palm 
leaves like a basket, and wore it regularly as a 
holiday-dress on Easter and Whitsunday. =^ 

The life of Saint Benedict, the great propagator 
of monastic life in the sixth century, has fur- 
nished the Breviary with several curious miracles. 
One of the first among the wonders he wrought, 
does not give a favourable idea of the character of 
religious associations at that period. Saint Bene- 
dict, having undertaken the government of a cer- 
tain monastery, where he wished to introduce a 

* "Cumque ad ejus cellani pervenisset, invenit genibus 
complicatis, erecta cervice, extensisque in altum manibus, 
corpus exanime: quod pallio obvolvens, hymnosque et psalmos 
ex Christiana traditionedecantans, cum sarculum, quo terrain 
foderet non haberet, duo leones ex interiore eremo, rapido 
cursu ad beati senis corpus ferunter: ut facile intellig-eretur, 
cos, quo modo poterant, ploratum edere; qui certatim terram 
pedibus efFodientes, foveam, quae hominem commode caperet, 
effecerunt. Qui cum abiissent, Antonius sanctum corpus in 
eum locum intulit: et injecta humo, tumulum ex Christiano 
more composuit; tunicam vero Pauli, quam in sportae modum 
ex palmx foliis ille sibicontexuerat secum auferens, eo vestitu 
diebus solemnibus Paschae et Pentecostes, quoad vixit, usus 
est," Die xv. Januarii.— I give the original words only far 
the passages which might appear exaggerated in my own 
descriptions. 



185 

moi'e severe discipline than the innuites were dis- 
posed to follow, had a poisoned cup presented by 
the monks. He would have fallen a victim to 
their wickedness but for the habit of making tlie 
sign of the cross overevery thing he eat or drank. 
The sign was no sooner made than the cup burst 
into pieces and spilt the deadly contents on the 
table. 

Saint Benedict is inseparably coupled in my re- 
collection with his sister, Saint Scholastica, who 
had the gift of working a peculiar kind of lights 
playful miracles, which our neighbours, tlie 
French, would probably denominate mirades de 
famille. By one of these, the holy nun Scholasti- 
ca, who paid a yearly visit to her brother in an 
outhouse of his monastery, wishing to keep him a 
whole night in conversationp|fcd not being able to 
persuade him, forced him to break the rule which 
bound him to sleep in his cell. The manner of 
carrying her point was simple enough. On hear- 
ing a positive refusal, she crossed her hands, laid 
them upon the table, then reclined her head upon 
them, and wept profusely. Her tears disturbed 
the state of the atmosphere, which, at that moment, 

was beautiful; and a violent storm of thunder and 
2 



186 

min instantly ensued. In a few minutes the rivers 
overflowed their banks, and the whole country 
around was like a sea. Benedict, who was fa- 
miliar with miracles, could not mistake the cause 
of the storm, and goodnaturedly reproached his 
sister. ^^What could I do?'^ said she with a 
saintly archness, of which none but readers of 
Ihe Breviary could ever suspect the existence: 
^'I entreated you, and was refused; I therefore 
asked my God, and he beared me. Now, brother, 
go if you can: leave me and run away to your 
monastery." This playfulness is the more sur- 
prising as the good lady Scholastica had then 
a certainty of her approaching death. Benedict 
saw her soul, in the shape of a dove, wing up her 
way to heaven only three days after this miracle. 
— The instructive flfcsons in which this is related 
eome from no vulgar pen. They are portions of 
the Dialogues of Pope Gregory the Grmt^ 

♦ Scholastica, venerabilis Patris Benedict! soror,....ad eum 
semel per annum venire consueverat: ad quam vir Dei non 
longe extra januam in possessione monasterii descendebat, 
Quadam vero die venit ex more, atque ad earn cum discipulis, 
venerabilis ejus descendit frater, qui totum diem in Dei lau* 
dibus, sanctisque colloquiis ducentes, incumbentibus jam noc-! 
ti% tenebris, simul acceperunt clbum. Cumque adhuc ad 



187 

No one, however, who observes the profusion 
of wonders recorded in the Breviary, can be sur- 

mensam sederent, et inter sacra colloquia tardior se hora pro* 
traheret, eadem sanctimonialis faemina soror ejus eum rogavit, 
dicens: "Quxso te, ut ista nocte me non deseras, ut usque 
mane de cxlestis vitae gaudiis loquamur." Gui ille respon- 
dit: "Quid est quod loqueris, sororp manere extra cellam 
nullatenus possum." Tanta vero erat coeli serenitas, ut nulla 
in acre nubes appareret. Sanctimonialis autem faemina, cum 
verba fratris negantis audivisset, insertas digitis manus super 
mensam posuit; et caput in manibus, omnipotentem Dominum 
rogatura, declinavit. Cumqiie levaret de mensa caput, tanta 
oorruscationis et tonitrui virtus, tantaqce inundatio pluvise 
erupit, ut neque venerabilis Benedictus, neque fratres qui cum 
60 aderant, extra loci limen, quo consederant, pedem movere 
potuerint. Sanctimonialis quippe faemina camit in manibus 
declinans, lacrymarum fluvium in mensam fuderat, per quas 
serenitatem aeris ad pluviam traxit. Nee paulo tardius post 
orationem inundatio ilia secuta est: sed tanta fuit convenien- 
tia orationis, et inundationis, ut de mensa caput jam cum 
tonitru levaret: quatenus unum idemque esset momentum, 
et l€^tfkie caput, et pluviam deponere. Tunc vir Dei, inter 
corruscos, et tonitruos, atque ingentis pluviac inundationem, 
videns se ad monasterium non posse remeare, coepit conqueri 
contristatus dicens: "Parcat tibi omnipotens Deus, soror, 
quid est quod fecisti?*' Cui ilia respondit; "Ecce rogavi te, 
etaudire me noluisti; rogavi Dominum meum, et audivit me: 
modo ergo, si potes, egredere, et me dimissa ad monasteri- 
um recede," &c. Dei 10 Februarii. 

The collect for the feast of Scholastica is both a specimen 
of the assurance with which the church of Rome circulates 
her legends, and of her tenets concerning the intercession of 
gaints. "Deus, qui animam beats Virginis tuae Scholastics 



188 

prised at these sportful displays of supernatural 
power. There is scarcely a saint who has not 
been honoured by miracles, which I would call 
ornamental. Celestial meteors have generally 
shone over the houses vdiere a future saint w as 
born, and the bells have rung of their own accord 
on the infant's coming to light:^ swarms of beas 
settled on their mouths, and even built a honey- 
comb in their hands, while lying in the cradle, f 
A baby saint had her face changed into a rose 
immediately after birth, that she might be called 
after that flower. :|: An angel in a bishop's robes, 
appeared ujpon the baptismal font, w here a future 
prelate was to be baptized. § The mothers of 
these extraordinary beings seldom were without 

ad ostendendam innocentiae viaro, in columbac specie coelum 
penetrare fecisti, da nobis, ejus mentis et precibus, itai|g|^en« 
ter vivere, ut ad aeternamereamur gaudia pervenire.*^^hi9 
IS almost an invariable form of words in the Roman Catholic 
collects. 

* St, John a Deo; St. Peter Celestinus, and many others. 

t St. Ambrose, St. Peter Nolascus, St. Isidore, and many 
others. 

± St. Rose a Sancta Maria. — "Vultus infantis, mirabiliter 
in ros?e effigiem transfiguratus, huic nomini occasionem de- 
dit." Die 30 Augusti. 

§ St Julian of Caenca. 



189 

prophetic dreams during the time of gestation.'^ 
Some saints performed miracles while yet in the 
womb; and it is asserted of St. Bridget that, in 
that invisible state, she saved her mother from 
shipwreck, f These holy children have not un- 
frequently spoken when scarcely five months oldj 
though the object of their speeches was seldom so 
important as that of St. Philip Beniti, when, at 
that age, he chid his mother for sending some 
begging monks empty from her door.ij: Nor was 
this wonder exhibited only in the embryo-saints; 
common every-day babes have often spoken, to 
discover the hiding-places of that nearly extinct 
generation of men, whom an impending mitre 
drove with affright into the fastnesses of deserts. 
St. Andrew Avellini, for instance, could not have 
been consecrated Bishop of Fiesole, unless he had 
been actually betrayed by the voice of an infant. § 
The apostles, who had received the power of 



* See the life of St. Andrew Avellini, and others passim. 

f " Cum adhuc in utero gestaretur, e naufragio, propter 
cam, mater erepta est.'* 

t ** Vix enim quintum setatis mensem ingressus, linguam 
in voces mirifice solvit, hortatusque fuit matrem, ut Deiparie 
servis eleemosynam impertiret." Die 23 Augusti. 

^ " Pueri voce mirab^iter loquentis proditus." 



190 

^vo^king miracles from Christ himself, for the 
great object of establishing his religion, appear 
to have been very limited in the use of their su- 
pernatural gifts; and never to have controlled the 
order of nature, except under the influence of that 
supernatural impulse, that unhesitating faith, 
which being in itself a miracle, was, in the strong 
and figiu'ative language of their divine Master, 
said to be able to move mountains. It is far 
otherwise with the wonder-workers of the Brevi- 
ary. While these modern saints lived on earth, 
nature suffered a daily interruption of her laws, 
and that often for their own personal convenience. 
With the exception of St. Paul's preservation 
from the bite of the viper, we do not find miracu- 
lous interpositions in his favour. Indeed the ac- 
count he gives of the hardships, dangers, and nar- 
row escapes during his ministry, shows that mi- 
racles were not wl'ought for his comfort. Mo- 
dern saints are more fortunate: Frances, a Ro- 
man widow, who enjoyed the familiar view and 
conversation of her guardian angel, once multi- 
plied a few crusts of bread, so as to afford a sub- 
stantial meal to fifteen nuns, and fill up a basket 
with the fragments. On another occasion she 



191 

allayed their thirst with a bunch of miraculous 
grapes; and more than once was preserved by su- 
pernatural influence, from the inconvenience of 
getting wet in the rain, or even from the sti^am 
of a river. ^ St. Andrew Avellini, retiring home 
in a storm, was equally preserved from the effects 
of rain. The benefit of this miracle was not only 
extended to his companions, but the whole com- 
pany had the advantage of seeing their way in a 
pitch-dark night, by the radiancy of the saint'g 
person, f 

These phosphoric appearances, as well as a 

* " Deus, qui beatam Franciscam famulam tuam, inter C2e* 
tera gratiae tuse dona, familiari ang"eli consuetudine decoras- 
ti," &c. Collect. 

" Non semel aquae, vel e coelo labentes, intactam prorsus, 
dum Deo vacaret reliquerunt. Modica panis frag-menta, qua 
vix tribus sororibus reficiendis fuissent satis, sic ejus preci- 
bus Dominus multiplicavit, ut quindecim inde exsaturatis, 
tantutn superfuerit, ut canislrum impleverit: et aliquando 
earumdem sororum extra urbem, mense Januario ligna pa- 
rantium, sitim, recentis uvae racemis ex vite in arbore pen- 
dentibus mirabiliter obtentis, abunde expleverit," Die 9 
IMartis. 

f "Cum enim intempesta nocte ab audita segri confessione 
domum rediret, ac pluviae ventorumque vis praelucentem fa- 
cem extinxisset, non solum ipse, cum sociis, inter effusissi- 
mos irabres nihil madefactus est, verum etiam inusitato splen- 
dore, e suo corpore mirabiliter emicante, sociis inter densis- 
simas teaebras iter monsti-avit." Die 10 Novembris. 



19% 

supernatural tendency to fly upwards, ai^ so com-* 
mon among saints of the last four or five centu- 
ries, that it would he tedious to mention indivi- 
dual instances. St. Peter of Alcantara, a saint 
very remarkable for antigravitating qualities, =* 
exhibited a very curious phenomenon in another 
storm. A tremendous fall of snow came on as 
he was returning at night to the convent. Dis- 
tressed for shelter, he entered a building, the most 
unfit for the occasion, as it wanted a roof to stop 
the snow. But the walls which still remained 
saved half the trouble to the miraculous agent em- 
ployed on this occasion. The snow congealed in- 
to a solid roof, and completed the building in which 
Peter passed the night, f The cooling properties 
of this structure must have been highly welcome 
to a man, whose charity (I relate what I find in 
the Breviary) so used to raise the temperature of 
his blood, that it obliged him to break out from his 
cell and run distracted into the fields. :}: 

* ^* In aera frequenter sublatus, miro fulgore corruscare 
visus est." 

■j- " Cum noctu iter ageret, densa nive cadente, dirutam 
domum sine tecto ingressus est, eique nix in acre pendula 
pro tecto fuit, ne illius copia suffocaretur.** 

^ " Charitas Dei et proximi in ejus corde diffusa, tantum 
quandoque excitabat incendium, ut e celiac augustiis m aper- 



■* 



198 

The repetition of miracles is a mattei^ of some 
curiosity, as it might be expected that powers 
which baffle the laws of nature, would display an 
inexhaustible variety. Yet we find the earliest 
miracles repeated, and many occur regularly in 
the life of every saint. Of the latter kind are 
the luminous appearance of their faces; the mul- 
tiplication or creation of food; living without sus- 
tenance; conversing with angels; emitting sweet 
effluvia from their dead bodies. More peculiar 
displays of supernatural interference appear, 
sometimes, at distant periods. St. Gregory, the 
wonder-worker of the fourth century, fixed his 
staff in the ground, and it instantly grew up into 
a tree which stopt the floods of the river Lycus. 
The lately mentioned Peter of Alcantara made 
also his staff grow into a fig tree, which the friars 
of his order have propagated by cuts, in every 

turn campum prosilire, aerisque refrigerio conceptum ardo- 
rem temperare cogeretur." — Another physical effect of chari- 
ty is recorded in the life of St. Philip Neri, whose chest be- 
ing too confined for the expansive ardour of that virtue, was 
miraculously enlarged by the fracture of two ribs. — "Chari- 
tate Dei vulneratus, languebat jugiter; tantoque cor ejus 
sestuabat ardore, ut cum inter fines suos contineri non posset, 
illius sinum, confractis atque elatis duabus CDStulis, mirabili- 
ter Dominus ampliaverit." Die 26 Mail. 



194 

part of Spain. This happened only in the six- 
teenth century, A raven provided Paul the her- 
mit with hread: a wild doe presented herself dai- 
ly to be milked by St. iEgidius. St. Eustachius, 
a martyr, said to have been a general under Tra- 
jan, was converted by seeing, in the chase, a 
stag bearing a crucifix between his antlers. St 
John of Matha founded the order of the Trini- 
ty, in consequence of seeing a similar animal 
with a tri-colour cross in the same position. — 
There are also certain miraculous feats, for which 
saints have shown a peculiar fondness. Three 
navigations on a mantle are recorded in the 
Breviary. St. Francis de Paula crossed the 
strait of Sicily on his own cloak, taking another 
monk as a passenger. St. Raymond de Penna- 
fort sailed in the same manner, from Majorca to 
Barcelona. St. Hyacinth, a Pole, though only 
a fresh water sailor, deserves no less credit for 
the management of his cloth vessel across the 
flooded Vistula, notwithstanding a heavy carga 
of monks. "^ 

• St. Francis de Paula. "Multis tniraculis servi sui sancti- 
tatem Deus testari volait, quorum illud in primis celebre, 
quod a nautis rejectus, Sicilise fretum, strato super fluctibus 
pallio, cum socio transmisit.'* Die 2 Aprili. 



195 

The mention of a Polish saint reminds me^ 
however, of a miracle performed by St. Stanis- 
laus, bishop of Cracow, which is not likely to 
have been often repeated. Stanislaus was on the 
point of being deprived of some lands, which he 
had purchased for his church. He could not 
show the title deeds; and the person to whom they 
formerly belonged, had been dead three years.— 
The king being a decided enemy of the bishop, 
no witness would come forward in his favour. — 
The diet of Poland was on the point of punishing 
Stanislaus for his supposed fraud^ when, to the 
no small amusement of the noblemen present, he 
engaged, within three days, to present the late 
possessor of the estate. On the third the saint 
called the dead man out of the grave. Peter 
(that was his name) rose without delay, and fol- 
lowed the bishop to the diet; where having duly 

St. Raymond de Pennafort. "Multa patravit miraculaj 
inter quae illud clarissimum, quod ex insula Baleari Majori 
Barcinonem reversurus, strato super aquas pallio, centum 
sexaginta milliaria sex horis confecerit; et suum coenobium 
januis clausis fuerit ingressus." Die 23 Januarii. 

St. Hyacinth. "Vandalum fluvium prope Visogradum 
aquis redundantem, nullo navigio usus trajecit, sociis quoque 
expanso super undas pallio, traductis." Die 16j(Augusti, 



196 

given his deposition in support of the bishop's 
right, he begged to be allowed to die again. ^ — 
The king was, however, too hardened to profit 
by this great miracle; and being enraged at the 
sentence of excommunication which the bishop 
soon after fulminated against him; killed him 
with his own hand, and ordered his body to be 
quartered and scattered about the fields. The 
wild beasts would have made a repast on the holy 
relics, but for the watchfulness of some eagles, 
which never allowed any one to touch them, till 
the canons of Cracow, led by the light thrown 
out by the scattered limbs, collected them the 
ensuing night. The different parts of the body^ 
when properly adjusted together, united as close- 
ly as kindred drops, and not a mark was left of 
the effects of the knife, f 

* "Spondet episcopus se Petrum, pagi venditorem, qui 
triennio ante obierat, intra dies tresin judicium adducturum. 
Conditione cum risu accepta, vir Dei . . . ipso sponsionis die, 
post oblatum Missae sacrificium, Petrum e sepulchro surgere 
jubet, qui statim redivivus, episcopum ad regium tribunal 
euntem sequitur, ibique rege, et caeteris stupore attonitis, 
de argo a se vendito, et pretio rite sibi ab episcopo persoluto 
testimonium dicit, atque iterum in Domino obdormivit." 

f "Corpus membratim concisum, et per agros projectum, 
aquilac a feris mirabiliter defendunt. Mox Canonici Cra- 



197 

Novel and singular as the history of Stanislaus 
appears, I have a suspicion that another dead 
witness has somewhere else, appeared before a 
court of justice; but I defy hagiography to match 
the miracles I am going to relate from the life of 
a Spanish saint recorded in the Breviary. 

St. Peter Armengaud, of the family of the 
counts of Urgel, had entered the Order of Mercy, 
and made some visits to Barbary for the libera- 
tion of Christian captives. The money collect- 
ed for that purpose being exhausted before he 
could ransom some boys, whose faith appeared to 
be wavering: he sent them away with his com- 
panion, and remained as a hostage for the full 
amount of the debt. Charity like this, exerted 
by a free choice, and without the dangerous and 
oppressive system of religious vows, would be 
worth all the miracles of the Breviary* But the 
marvellous is a necessary element in every 
saint's life; and the good friars of the Mercy, 
have mixed it here in a rather undue proportion* 

Goviences sparsa membra, nocturni de coelo splendorls Indi- 
cio colligunt, et suis locis apte disponunt, quae subito ita inter 
se copulata sunt, ut nulla vulnerum vestigia extarent." Die 
7 Maii. 

P 2 



198 

Peter waited for his companion with a very 
natural anxiety; but the expected money did not 
come on the appointed day, and the barbarians 
settled the account by hanging their hostage. — 
Great indeed was the distress of Father William, 
on learning the sad consequences of his delay: 
yet the body of a martyr was worth having, 
and he insisted upon carrying it back to Spain. 
The Moors had no objection to part with it, and 
willingly led the monk to the place where Peter 
was still hanging by the neck. Three days in 
that posture would have closed a wind-pipe of 
brass; but Peter^s was sufficiently free to address 
his religious brother, as soon as he saw him 
within hearing. The Virgin Mary, he informed 
him, had, since his execution, supported the 
weight of his body, and was still holding him 
up at that ^moment. Ndt to prolong the neces- 
sity of supernatural assistance, Peter was cut 
down without delay. Of the pleasures he had 
experienced while hanging, he used always to 
speak in raptures; notwithstanding a wry neck 
and habitual paleness for life, which the Virgin 
allowed him to keep, in remembrance of her assist- 
ance. It seems that, omitting the rope and beam,. 



199 

the scene of suspension was often repeated between 
Peter and his glorious prop; for the Breviary 
informs us that he frequently was seen raisAin 
the air, uttering ^^the sweetest words'' in answer 
to questions which the bystanders heard not, but 
conjectured, most rationally, to proceed from the 
Virgin. =^ 

^^May I not ask (says the author of the Book 
of the Roman Catholic Church}, if it be either 

♦ "Ipse interim compedibus detentus, cum ad statutam 
diem parta pro redemptione merces non fuisset allata, et Ma- 
hometicae siiperstitionis haberetur contemptor, collo ad lig-num 
suspenditur. Ex Hispania ejgs socius Guillelmus cum re- 
demptionis pretio in Africam interea revertitur, et graviter 
beati viri amissionem deflens, ad locum ubi suspensus mane- 
bat, accessit; quem viventem reperit, sibique dicentem audi- 
Vit: *Charissime frater, ne fleveris; ecce enim sanctissimae Vir- 
ginis manibus sustentatus vivo, quae mihi his diebus hilariter 
adfuit." Inenarrabili itaque gaudio ilium e suspendio depo- 
suit, et, cunctis demirantibus, ac barbaris non credentibus, 
una cum aliis libertate donatis, laeti in patriam reversi sunt. 
Ex illo autem tempore beatus Petrus coUum e supplicio obtor- 
tum, et vultum squalore marcidum, quoad vixit, retinuit.... 
Frequenter alienatus a sensibus in aerem sublatus, suavissima 
verba proferre auditus est, quibus, ut adstantibus videbatur, 
beatissimae Virgini interroganti respondebat; suique martyrii 
memor, hsec fratribus dicere erat solitus: *Ego, credite mihi, 
nullos reputo me vixisse dies, przeter felicissimos illos paucos, 
quibus ligno suspensus, mundo putabar jam mortuus. Officia 
propria SS, Hispanorum, die 27 Aprilis/ ** 



300 

just or generous to harass the present Catholics 
Vv'ith the weakness of the ancient writers of 
thjfl| communion; and to attempt to render their 
religion and themselves odious hy these unceasing 
and offensive repititions V^ This complaint should 
be addressed to the Pope and the Roman Catholic 
bishops, by whose authority, consent, and practice, 
these weaknesses ai^e unceasingly repeated for the 
instruction of the members of their communion. I 
can sympathise with the feelings of the author: I 
can easily conceive how galling it must be for a 
moderniz>edRoui2in Catholic, in this country, to be 
constantly suspected of being a Roman Catholic, 
indeed, and according to the Pope's heart. His 
case is as deplorable as that of a man of fashion, 
who should be compelled to fi^equent the higher 
circles in company with an old, fantastic, half- 
crazed mother, who daily and hourly exposed her- 
self to contempt and ridicule, in spite of his filial 
efforts to hide her absurdities. The truth is, that 
the Protestants have nearly forgotten the mon- 
strous heap of falsehood and imposture from which 
Rome daily feeds her flock. But the offensive 
repetitions resound on the ears of your harassed 
apologist from the lips of every bishop, priest. 



201 

deacon and subdeacon of his communion: they are 
chanted incessantly in every Roman Catholic ca- 
thedral, in every convent of males or females: they 
are translated into popular tracts:^ they are heard 
and read with avidity by the mass of straight-for- 
w^ard, uncompromising Catholics, and cannot be 
scouted by the more fastidious, without a direct 
reproach on the most constant, solemn, and author- 
ized practice of their church. In vain would the 
suffering scholar, the harassed man of refinement, 
attempt a distinction between the miracles of dark 
ages, and those of more modern times: in vain 
would he venture a smile on the ^^ Golden Legend, 
and the patrician Metaphrastes.'' His mother 
church has thrown her mantle over them, by 
borrowing from them all for her own peculiar 
book, her own corrected work, the task-book of 
all her clergy. He must remember that the weak* 



* 1 believe that these stories are much circulated among 
the Roman Catholics of these kingdoms in the shape of popu- 
lar pamphlets. I have not, however, been able to procure a 
copy, owing to the unwillingness of Roman Catholic booksel- 
lers to furnish unknown purchasers with a certain peculiar 
produce of their press. I had strong reasons to suspect the 
existence of this policy, when it was confirmed to me by the 
personal experience of a clerical friend. 



203 

nesses for which he implores the benefit of obliviou 
are no more imputable to their original and ancient 
sources, btit to the Popes who republished them 
at the Vatican, in 16S1; to the church, who with 
one accordant voice repeats them to the faithful 
of all climates and languages. 

It were w ell, how^ever, for the happiness and 
virtue of the spiritual subjects of Rome, if their 
church had sanctioned weaknesses only— absurdi- 
ties which degrade the understanding — and had 
left the rules of Christian conduct undisturbed. 
But the Breviary is not more absurd in matters 
of fact than depraved in the views of moral per* 
fection, which it disseminates. I will not, how- 
ever, dwell long upon this topic, since the attach- 
ment of the church of Rome to monastic virtue, 
has at all times betrayed her distorted views of 
evangelical perfection. The specimens which I 
am about to select from the multitude of her 
saintly models, are not intended to convict her of 
errors which she glories in, but to impress their 
consequences on those that seldom or never dwell 
upon these important topics. As I cannot se- 
parate, in these specimens, what strictly belongs 
to the subject on which I am going to touch% 



208 

from the miraculous ornaments with ^iiich the^e 
legends are crowded, I beg you to keep this in 
mind, that the progress and course of my argu- 
ment may he perceived. 

Whatever may be the freedom which Rome 

allows in the belief or rejection of her miracles 

whatever be the unfairness of asserting and pro- 
pagating absurdities, under the excuse that no 
force is employed to ensure their reception — whe- 
ther the church that sanctions and uses the Bre- 
viary believes the accounts it contains, or secretly 
smiles at tlie credulity of those who credit them; 
it might be hoped that the models proposed for 
imitation would have been safe in regard of Chris- 
tian practice. This is certainly not the case. 
There is, indeed, in most of the Roman Catholic 
saints much of that benevolent spirit of the Grospel, 
which must always be found in every heart which 
opens itself to the divine influence of its leading 
truths; but Christian charity is in them so mixed 
with substantial and pervading errors, that it is 
seldom unproductive of evil. 

The first noxious ingredient which poisons cha- 
rity in the Roman Catholic system of sanctity, is 
intolerance. The seeds of this bitter plant are, in- 



deed, inseparable from a hearty reception of her 
doctrines, as I have proved before; but its mature 
fruit, persecution, is praised among the virtues of 
saints whose circumstances enabled them to use 
force against pagans or heretics. Thus, in the life 
of Canute the Dane, his donations to the church 
are hardly more commended than the zeal with 
which he conquered the barbarians, with the pur- 
pose of making them Christians.-^ St. Ferdi- 
nand, King of Castille, is represented as an emi- 
jient sample of that peculiar Roman Catholic vir- 
tue which visits dissent from the faith of Rome 
witli the mild correctives of sword and fire. "In 
alliance with the cares of government, the regal 
virtues (says the Breviary) shone in him— mag- 
nanimity, clemency, justice, and above all zeal for 
the Catholic faith, and an ardent determination to 
defend and propagate its worship. This he per- 
formed, in the first place, by persecuting heretics, 
to whom he allowed no repose in any part of his 
kingdom; and for whose execution, when^con- 

* "Religioni promo vendse sedulo incumbens, ecclesias red- 
ditibus augere, et pretiosa snpellectili ornare coepit Turn 
zelo propagandse fidei succensus, barbara regna justo certa- 
mine ag-gressas, devictas, subditasque nationes Christians 
fidei subjugavit." Die 19 Januarii. 



20S 

demned to be burnt, he used to carry the w^d 
with his own hands/'=^ Who then shall be sur- 
prised to find inquisitors canonized by Rome, or 
to hear her addressing a daily prayer to the great 
and merciful Father of mankind, ^^that he would 
be pleased to bruise, by the power of his right 
hand, all pagan and heretical nations ?'' Such are 
the words which Rome puts in the mouth of every 
Spanish priest who celebrates high mass.f 

The power of persecuting othei^ upon the grand 
scale, which the Church of Rome exalts into a 
kingly virtue, is given but to very few among 
mankind: whilst every individual may be made 
his own tormentor by adopting the practices 
which that church represents as the means to 

* "In eo, adjunctis regni curls, regiae virtutes emicuere, 
magnanimitas, dementia, justitia, et prae caeteris Catholicae 
Fidei zelus, ejusque religiosi cultus propagandi ardens stu- 
dium. Id praestitit in primis haereticos insectando, quos nuUi- 
bi regnorum suorum consistere passus, propriis ipse manibus 
ligna comburendis damnatis adrogum, advehebat." Propria 
Ss. Hispan. Die 30 Maii. 

t The concluding collect contains a prayer for the Pope in 
the first, for the bishop of the diocess in the second, and for 
the royal family in the third place; it then proceeds to pray 
for peace and health, and concludes; "et ab ecclesia tua cunc* 
tarn repelle nequitiam, et gextes Paganorum et Hjebeticc^- 

R17M DEXTERiE TVM PQTENTIA C02rT£RANTUB» &C. &C, 

Q 



206 

arrive at C hristian perfection. Zeal and sincerity, 
are equally dangerous under the tuition of Rome. 
The Catholic nunneries rob society of the most 
amiable and virtuous female minds — ^those viho 
in the practice of the social duties, would be a 
blessing to their relatives and friends, and pat- 
terns of virtue to the community — to make their 
lives, at the best, a perpetual succession of toil- 
some and useless practices. The quiet and sober- 
minded are made the slaves of outward ceremo- 
nies; the ardent and sensitive are doomed to en- 
thusiasm or madness. Such are the invariable 
results of the models which Rome presents them 
daily for imitation. 

The love of external ceremonies is notorious in 
the Roman Catholic church; but few, even among 
the persons whom I address, will probably have 
given a distinct and separate consideration to the 
special models, by which their church sanctions 
and recommends this peculiar manner of sanctity. 
Let them, therefore, conceive themselves as con- 
temporaries of Saint Patrick, and imagine they 
see him pursuing the regular and daily employ- 
ment of his time. The holy saint rises before 
daylight, and, under the snows and rainirof a 



207 

northern winter, begins his usual task of praying 
one hundred times in a day^ and again one hun- 
dred times in the night. Such, the Breviary in- 
forms, was his daily practice while still a layman 
and a slave. When raised to the see of Armagh, 
his activity in the external practice of prayer ap- 
pears quite prodigious. In the first place he re- 
peated, daily, the one hundred and fifty psalms 
of the Psaltery, with a collection of canticles and 
hymns, and two hundred collects. The tw'o hun- 
dred genuflexions of his youth were now increased 
to three hundred. The ecclesiastical day being 
divided into eight canonical hours, and each of 
these having one hundred blessings with the sign 
of the cross allotted by Saint Patrick, his right 
hand must have performed that motion eight hun- 
dred times a day. After this distracting stir and 
hurry, the night brought but little repose to the 
saint. He divided it into three portions: in the 
first he recited one hundred psalms, and knelt two 
hundred times; during the second he stood im- 
mersed in cold water repeating ^/^i/ psalms more, 
^*with his heart, eyes, and hands raised towards 
heaven;'' the third he gave up to sleep, upon a 



a08 

stone pavement. * Imagine to yourselves, I agaiu 
request, the patron saint of Ireland, not as au 
ideal and indistinct personage of legend; but as a 
real man of jflesh and blood. Depict, in the vivid 
colours of fancy, the bustle, the perpetual motion, 
the eternal gabbling, the plunging into w ater for 
prayer, the waving of the hands for benedictions, 
the constant falling upon the knees, the stretching 
of hands, the turning up of eyes, required for the 
ascetic practices of his life; and then repeat the 
memorable words of our Saviour — The hour 
Cometh^ and now iSj when the true worshippers 
shall worship the Father^ in spirit and in truth; 
for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God 
is a spirit} and they that worship him must wor^ 



* "Antelucano tempore per nives, gelu, ac pluvias ad pre- 
cfes Deo fiindendas, impiger consurgebat; solitus centies inter- 
diu, centiesque noctu Deum orare...Aiunt enim integrum quo- 
tidie Psalterium, una cum canticis et hyranis, ducentisqae 
orationibus consuevisse recilare: ter centies per dies singulos 
flexis genibus Deum adorare, ac in qualibet Hora Canonica, 
centies se crucis signo munire. Noctem tria in spatia dis- 
tribuens, primum in centum psalmis percurrendis, et bis cen- 
ties genuflectendo, alterum in reliquis quinquaginta psalmis, 
algidis aquis immersus, ac corde, oculis, manibusque ad coelum 
erectus, absolvendis insumebat: tertium vero super nudum 
lap idem stratus, tenui dabat quieti. Die 17 Martii. 



209 

skip him in spirit and in tnith.^ Compare the 
sublime simplicity of this description of Christian 
piety, with the models which your church sets be- 
fore you: and tell me whether they agree. I will 
not dispute whether the list of devotional practices 
attributed to Saint Patrick, be authentic or fic- 
titious, accurate or exaggerated. The church of 
Rome would not have recorded it in her authorized 
book of spiritual instruction, if, in her opinion, it 
did not exalt the piety of her saint. The worthies 
of the Breviary, whether sketched from nature or 
pictured from fancy, must be a faithful tanscript 
of Rome's ideal models of Christian perfection. 
The practices attributed to Saint Patrick are, 
therefore, made an object of imitation to all the 
sons of the church of Rome, according to their 
strength and circumstances^ and the principle 
that such practices are a part of Evangelical 
virtue, will not be questioned by a sincere Roman 
Catholic. Indeed, among the saints of the Bre- 
viary, most will be found commended for similar 
practices; and not a book of devotion, by writers 
of that communion exists, which does not repre-^ 



♦ John iv. 23, 24. 

0.2 



310 

^ent some bodily exercise or distortion, as an ef- 
fectual method of pleasing God.^ 

All this, however, is intimately connected with 
the Roman Catholic notions on penance — a subject 
which well deserves the dispassionate considera- 
tion of every impartial member of that communion. 

If it be once settled that self-inflicted suffering 
is, by itself, a virtue; the progress between a simple 
fast and the tortures voluntarily endured by the 
Indian fanatics, is natural and unbroken. The 



* The least morose of all Roman Catholic saints, Saint 
Francis de Sales, though not carrying these practices to the 
degree usual among professed saints, strongly recommends 
tliis kind of spiritual gymnastics to his friends. The follow- 
ing are his directions to a gentleman *'gui vouloit se retirer du 

"Je vous conseille de pratiquer ces exercises pour cestrois 
mois suivans....que vous vous leviez toujours a six heures 
matin, soit que vous ayez bien dormi, ou mal dormi, pourvu 
que vous ne soyez pas malade (car alors il faut condescendre 
%\x mal) et pour faire quelque chose de plus les vendredis, 
vous vous leviez a cinq heures.. ..Item, que vous vous accout- 
iimiez a dire tous les jours, apres ou devant roraison; quinze 
I*ater noster et quinze Ave, Maria, les bras etendus en guise 
de crucifix.. .Encore, voudrois-je quelquefois la semaine vous 
couchassiez vetu....et ces jours-la de fete, vous pourrez bien 
visiter par maniere d'exercice les lieux saints des capucins, 
S. Bernard, les Chartreux." — Lettres de Saint Francois de 



Mil 

practice of Roman Catholic saints, approaches 
very nearly indeed to that of the Eastern worship- 
pers of the evil principle. Open the Breviary at any 
of the pages containing the lives of saints, males or 
females, and you will find uninterrupted absti- 
nence from food (whether real or not, certainly 
held out to admii^ation, and sanctioned by the 
assertion of miracles in its favour) since Ash 
Wednesday till Whitsunday:^ living one half of 
the year on bread and water :f confinement for 
four years to a niche excavated in a rock;:j: and 
every where the constant use of flagellation, 
lacerating bandages, and iron chains bound con- 
stantly about the body, immersions in freezing 
water, and every method of gradually and pain- 
fully destroying life. The Roman Catholics 
will talk of penance in moderation; but where is 
the line drawn, where, indeed, can it be drawn^ 
to point th^ beginning of excess? Must I again 
revive the memory of the victims whom I have 
seen perish in their youth^ from the absolute im- 

* Life of St. Catherine of Sienna. 
7 St. Elizabeth of Portugal. 

4: The blessed Daimatius Monerius, in ti^e Propria SS. 
Hispan, 



2i2 

possibility of moderating the entliusiam whieh 
their church thus encourages? It is chiefly 
among the tender and delicate of the female sex^ 
that the full effects of these examples are seen. — 
How can a confessor prescribe limits to the zeal 
of an ardent mind, which is taught to please God 
by tormenting a frail body ? Teach an enthusias- 
tic female that self-inflicted death will endear her 
to her heavenly bridegroom, and she will press 
the rope or the knife to her lips. Distant danger 
is lighter than a feather to hearts once swollen 
with the insane affections of religious enthusiasm. 
Talk to them about the duty of preserving life, 
and they will smile at the good natured casuis- 
try, which w^ould moderate their pursuit of a 
more noble and more disinterested duty — ^that of 
loving their God above their own lives. Their 
church has besides, practically dispensed the du- 
ty of self-preservation in favour of penance. — 
Does not the young victim read of her model 
Saint Theresa, that ^ 'her ardour in punishing the 
body was so vehement as to make her use hair- 
shirts, chains, nettles, scourges, and even to roll 
herself among thorns, regardless of a diseased 
constitution?'* — Is she not told that St. Rosc^ 



S13 

"from a desire to imitate St. Catharine,^ wore, 
day and night, three folds of an iron chain round 
her waist; a belt set w ith small needles, and an 
iron crown armed inside with points? That she 
made to herself a bed of the unpolished trunks of 
trees, and that she filled up the interstices with 
pieces of broken pottery?'^ She did all this in 
spite of her ^ ^tortures fi-om sickness,'^ and by 
this means she obtained the frequent visits of 
saints and angels; and heard Christ himself utter- 
ing the words, ''Rose of my hearty be thou my 
hride.^^ Can the poor, weak, visionary recluse 
doubt the reality of scenes attested by her church, 
or question the lawfulness of slow self-murder, 
supported by the brightest of her commended 
models?! 

* observe the effect of the proposed models. The Bre- 
viary records a number of similar imitations: every one ac- 
quainted with Roman Catholics must have seen them repeat- 
ed every day. 

f St. Theresa .... "Per duodeviginti annos gravissimis 
morbis et variis tentationibus vexata, constantissime meruit 
in castris Christianae poenitentix . . . Infidelium et haareticorum 
tenebras perpetuis deflebat lacrymis, atque ad plaeandam 
divinae ultionis iram, voluntaries proprii corporis cruciatus 
Deo, pro eorum salute dicabat . . . Tam anxio castigandi cor- 
poris desiderio sestuabat, ut quamvis secus suaderent morb^ 



S14 

The only rational principle which can regu- 
late self-denial, and give it the stamp of a Chris- 
tian virtue, would condemn the whole of the 
monkish system at once: Rome, therefore, can- 
not, will not admit it. Make the good of man- 
kind the only ground for voluntary endurance of 
pain,' make the habit of rational self-denial (with- 
out which extensive usefulness is impossible) the 



quibus affllctabatur, corpus ciliciis, catenis, urticarum mani- 
pulis, aliisque asperrimis flagellis ssepe cruciaret, et aliquan- 
do inter spinas volutaret, sic Deum alloqui solita: *Domine, 
aut pati aut mori' . . . Ei morienti adesse visas est inter an- 
gelorum agmina Christus Jesus: et arbor arida celix proxinia 
statim effloruit/* Die 15 Octobris. 

St. Rose of Lima . . , "Oblongo asperrimoque cilicio spar- 
sim minusculas acus intexuit; sub velo coronam densis acu- 
leis introrsus obarmatam, interdiu noctuque gestavit. Sanc- 
tae Catherinae Senensis ardua premens vestigia, catena ferrea, 
triplici nexu circumducta, lumbos cinxit. Lectulum sibi e 
truncis nodosis composuit, horumque vacuas commissuras 
frag-minibus testarum implevit. Cellulam sibi angustissiman 
struxit in extreme horti angulo, ubi caelestium contemplation! 
dedita, crebis disciplinis, inedia, vigiliis corpusculum ex- 
tenuans, at spiritu, vegetata, larvas dxmonum frequenti cer- 
tamine victrix, impavide protrivit ac superavit . . . Exinde 
coepit supernis abundare deliciis, iliustrari visionibus, coUU 
quescere Seraphicis ardoribus. Angelo tutelari, sanctx 
Catbarinae Senensi, Virgini Deiparae inter assiduas apparitio- 
nes mire familiaris, a Christo has voces audire meruit: *Kosa 
cordis mei, tu mihi sponsa esto.' " Die 30 Augusti. 



gl5 

object of certain slight privations, used as a dis- 
cipline of mind and body; and a convent assumes 
the character of a mad-house. Penance is, con- 
sequently, erected into an independent virtue, 
and saints are made to appear after death, in 
glory, to proclaim the Indian doctrine of heaven- 
ly enjoyments purchased by bodily sufferings.^ 
The models which Rome presents for imitation, 
are not more removed from the spiritual simpli- 
city of the Gospel, than they are from that sober- 
ness of devotional feeling which pervades the 
whole of the New Testament. Read the lives of 
saints who have lived since the beginning of the 
sixteeeth century; and, whether male or female, 
you will find a sentimentality of devotion, a sus- 
picious kind of tenderness, which from time to 
time, has alarmed the truly sincere sons of Rome, 
under the grosser shape of devotional sensuality. 
There is, I am aware, a distinction between the 
raptures of St. Theresa, and the ecstatic reveries 
of the quietists; but on reading her own account 
of her feelings, and hearing the description which 

* St. Peter of Alcantara is said to have appeared after 
death to St. Theresa, and exclaimed: O felix pxnitenHat qum 
tantammihipromeruit gloriam! Die 31 Octobris. 



ai6 

the church of Rome gives of her visions, it is im- 
possible not to observe that both have some moral 
elements in common. The picture of St. The- 
resa fainting under the wound which an angel in- 
flicts on her heart with a fiery spear, were it not 
for the nun's weeds worn by the principal figure; 
might easily be mistaken for a votive tablet in- 
tended for some heathen temple: and her dying 
^ ^rather of love than disease'' is more worthy of a 
novel of doubtful tendency, than of a collection of 
lives prepared by a Christian church, to exem- 
plify the moral effects of the Gospel. =^ 

* "Tanto autem divlni amoris incendio cor ejus conflagra- 
VI t, ut merito viderit angelum ignito jaculo sibi praccordia 
transverberantem; et audierit Christum data dextera dicen- 
tem sibi: *Deinceps ut vera sponsa meum zelabis honorem.' " 
(I cannot venture any remarks on the apposition of these 
emblems.) "Intolerabili igitur divini amoris incendio potius^ 
quam vi morbi....sub columbae specie purissimum animum 
Deo reddidit." Ubi supra. — I must observe, without howe- 
ver insinuating any things more than the dangerous nature of 
this kind of devotion, that in male saints it generally has the 
Virgin for its object. The life of St. Bernard contains de- 
scriptions of visions, which would be unfit for the eye of the 
public in any other book. Hagiography, however, gives 
great liberty both to writers and painters. The picture of 
the vision I allude to, I have seen in a convent of Cistercian 
Nuns. The Breviary, however, omits the story which forms 
its subject. 



217 

Does the Breviary produce effects analogous to 
the character of its contents/ and commensurate 
to the extent of the use of it by the Roman Ca- 
tholics? Does it everywhere degrade faith into 
credulity, and devotion into sentimentality? That 
it does so among Roman Catholics, in Italy, in 
Spain, in Portugal, and in all other countries 
where the religion of Rome predominates; is a 
matter of general notoriety. It would afford an 
additional praise of the reformed religion, if it 
could be proved that the Roman Catholics of 
Great Britain and Ireland, had been preserved 
from the injurious effects which the true book of 
their church, has so widely produced among their 
foreign brethren. It is possible that the class of 
Roman Catholics to whom I have addressed my- 
self in these letters, and who alone are likely to 
read them, have never since their childhood exa- 
mined the devotional books published in England 
for the use of the sincerely pious among them. If 
they should be well acquainted with such books, 
they will not require any further proof of the per- 
fect agreement between the minds and feelings of 
such persons, and those which I have instanced 

from the Breviary. Such as may have forgotten. 
R 



318 

the character of their devotional books would do 
well to re-peruse them. I will, however, in the 
mean time, give one or two specimens, from the 
TWELFTH London edition, of the Devotion and 
Office of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.^ I 
have so much exceeded the length which I pro- 
posed to give this letter, that I will not detain 
my readers much longer upon this subject. 

The ostensible Roman Catholics of England, I 
mean such as appear in the character of speci- 
mens of their religious communion, are so dex- 
terous in the use of theological distinctions, so 
practised in the pious work of throwing a cloak 
over the nakedness of their spiritual parent, that 
the Protestant public will hardly expect the fol- 
lowing rule of belief, upon matters not strictly 
of dogmatic faith, prevalent among the pious and 
sincere Roman Catholics of these realms. The 
rule applies to the subject of revelations and 
miracles, such as the Roman Church records in 
her Breviary. 

^^The public is in possession of many writings 
of holy women, who have yielded to advice and 

• Extracts from this book will beibuiid in an appendix, 
<fter the Notes to these Letters. 



S19 

obeyed their spiritual directors. They contain 
an account of many revelations, celestial visions^ 
and other extraordinary graces, which they have 
received from God. Now I reason thus: either 
these writings were penned by the saints, or they 
were not. If they were, either they designedly 
published a falsehood^ or were themselves delud- 
ed, and have given us idle dreams. Will you 
suppose that they were not the real authors of 
these works? You shock every idea of reason and 
common sense. The man who will venture to 
deny that St. Theresa wrote her life, may doubt 
of her existence. But you will say she was de- 
luded, and her imagination deluded all she wTote. 
The delusion must be the work of the e^dl spirit, 
which no Catholic can believe to have had any 
power over the chaste spouse of Jesus Christ, 
canonized by the church. If imagination pre- 
vailed, it is true she was not a hypocrite, but a 
fool. I shudder at the thought of so impious, so 
groundless an imputation. Who can believe that 
these saints lived in a perpetual aberration of 
mind ? I say perpetual, for we are not here treat- 
ing of transient acts, which lasted a few hours 
or days, or even during certain periods of lift. 



320 

but the duration of which is measured by the 
whole extent of their existence/^^ I know this 
argument to be unanswerable upon the principles 
of a sincere Roman Catholic; and cannot but feel 
pained to see that it must have weight with mil- 
lions of Britons. Such is the genuine work of 
Rome among the most thinking people of Eu- 
rope! Strange that a set of Italian priests should 
have it in their pow er thus to emasculate under- 
standings, which claim kindred with Locke, Na- 
pier, and Berkeley, 

Nor is their power less effectual in rendering 
Christian devotion in these kingdoms as childish, 
disgusting, and contemptible as it appears in the 
worst pages of the Breviary. I have at this mo- 
ment before me an .Angelical Exercise^ which the 
same English Manual of Devotion recommends 
in the following terms: ^ ^Whosoever is devoted 
to this exercise in honour of the blessed Virgin 
Mary, in reading^ over every point, may medi- 
tate upon it for the space of one Hail Mary^ or 
more, and by God's grace, he will in a short time 
find himself greatly increase in love towards that 

* Pajre70, 



331 

|[)lessed queen of Heaven; and at the hour of 
death will, by so pious a mother, he received as 
her dearest child. Nor can such a one, accord- 
ing to St. Anselm and St. Bernard, possibly pe- 
rish, but shall find life everlasting, and taste of 
the joys of eternal bliss.'^^ 

Under these assurances the devout Roman Ca- 
tholic is urged to peruse a series of questions, as 
from the Virgin Mary, and give his own answers, 
in the words which the book suggests* I select, 
the Exercise for Monday as a specimen, not be- 
cause its tone of devotion is more purile than 
the rest, but as containing a fresh and striking 
proof of the indefatigable industry of Roman Ca- 
tholic priests, in entrapping young people to 
take the dangerous vow of perpetual celibacy* 

*^I am the Queen of Virgins, Regina Virgiminiy^ 
says the glorious Mother of God. Will you, my 
dear child, remain a virgin all your life, andlive^ 
as it were, an angel in flesh, as did my dearly 
beloved son Aloysius Gonzaga, St. Agnes, St* 
Catherine, and a thousand others, my devoted 
children, who have rather chosen to lose their lives 
than their virginity? I will lave you as I havo 

* Pa^e 275. 
R £ 



322 

loved them, and cherish you as I cherish the an- 
gels, and, if it be possible, more than the angels 
themselves; and moreover, my child, I will ob- 
tain your name shall be written in the book of 
the blessed; and assure you, with a heart truly 
maternal, that at your death you will wish you 
had been the most chaste and holy in the world. 
Think well upon it, and resolve the best. — Hail 
Mary!'^ 

<^Yes, my most dear Mother! I desire to be 
pure all my life, as well in body as soul: I 
do, I say, most humbly desire it, and most ear- 
nestly beseech you, dear Lady, to obtain for me 
that which you so much recommend to me. I 
do here, prostrate, reverence you, sacred Virgin 
Mary, Mother of the Word incarnate! and to- 
gether with the holy thrones and all celestial 
spirits, ever bless and praise you infinitely, the 
Morning Star, Stella Matutina; for that you, the 
most beautiful of all creatures, were the first that 
did vow perpetual chastity, preparing the way to 
so many virginal souls which have already fol- 
lowed, and shall hereafter follow you in so high, 
so glorious, and so divine^ an enterprise.— Hail 
Mary!'* 



22B 

In the name of the Father of Spirits, ^^whose 
eyes are upon the truth/' I entreat such as love 
the Author of our commcn faith, more than the 
name of a religious party, not to efface the im- 
pression of shame which these passages must 
produce, by the usual method of recrimination. I 
protest before Heaven, that neither through these 
quotations, nor by any expression which in the 
course of this work may have flowed from my 
feelings, it has been my purpose to hurt yours. 
Remember, that whatever absurdities you might 
glean from Protestant writers, cannot affect a 
church whose authorized articles of faith and form 
of prayer, have nothing in common with such 
aberrations from common sense and the Gospel. 
Observe, on the other hand, how naturally the 
credulity and dangerous sentimentality with which 
your pious books abound, flow from the system of 
Rome, exhibited in her Prayer-book^ as well as in 
her whole conduct in regard to miracles and devo- 
tional practices. Remark the activity and watch- 
fulness with which she has at all times persecuted 
all kinds of books, wherein the least insinuation 
was thrown out, not against her articles of faith, 
but even the least part of this her deluding system. 



224 

Compare it with the supine indifference which she 
exhibits in giving free course to thousands of books 
whicli, at this very day, propagate every thing 
that can degrade the understanding and enfeeble 
the mind, under the name of piety. When you 
have candidly and honestly weighed all this, decide 
with yourselves, if it be not the part of every 
ingenuous and liberal Catholic of these kingdoms^ 
to strike out the Roman from his religious deno- 
mination, and place in its stead the noble epithet 
of Christian ? Preserve, with God's blessing, so 
much of your tenets as may appear to you con- 
sistent with his word^* but disown a church which, 
by her miracles, libels the Gospel history with 
imposture^ and whose mawkish piety disfigures, 
the sublime Christian worship into drivelling im- 
becility. 



NOTES, 



A^ — Page 43. 

Though it is impossible that Mr. Southey can 
omit to take notice of the strange charge which his 
antagonist makes against him, respecting a passage 
of Paulus Emilius Veronensis, Mr. Butler's halluci- 
nation is so extraordinary on this point, that I 
must expose it as a general caution to my readers. 

The passage relates to some deputies of the city 
of Palermo, who came to implore the Pope's mercy 
in behalf of their fellow-citizens. I will copy both 
the I^atin words and the translation of them from 
Mr. B.'s Book of the R. C. Church, pp. 131 and 132, 
first edition. 

"Cum apud Pontificem de hac consternatione age- 
retur, a Panormitanis missos ad eum oratores, viros 
sanctos, qui ad pedes illius strati, velut pro arahos- 
tiaque, Christum agnum Dei salutantes, ilia etiam 
ex altaris mysteriis verba supplices effarentur — ^Qui 
tollis peccata m.undi, miserere nostri: — Qui tollis 
peccata mundi, miserere nostri: — Qui tollis peccata 
mundi, dona nobis pacem.' Pontificem respondisse, 
Panormitanos agere quod fecissent, qui, cum Christ- 
um pulsaient, eundem regem Judaeorum salutabant* 
re hoste^j fando salvere jubentes," 



226 

Mr. Butler thus translates the passage: '- 
^'The city of Palermo having grievously offended 
the Pope, sent some holy men to him as ambassa- 
dors, who prostrated themselves at his feet, And 
SALUTED Christ the Lamb of God, as before an altar 
and the blessed sacrament, and suppliantly pro- 
nounced the mystic words of the altar, 'Lamb of 
God, who takest away the sins of the world, have 
mercy upon us! Who takest away the sins of the 
world, give us peace!' The Pope replied by telling 
them, that they acted like those who, after they had 
struck Christ, saluted him King of the Jews; that in 
reality they were his enemies, although in these 
words they wished him health." 

This translation makes the transaction quite un- 
intelligible. The ambassadors saluted Christ, 
and yet the Pope, taking the salutation to himself, 
accuses them of being his enemies in reality, though 
in the words they had used they wished him health. 
The fact is, that a school-boy that can construe the 
Selecta e Profanis would be able to clear the difficul- 
ty at once. Had Mr. Butlor taken notice of the 
velut, which qualifies the whole of the next sen- 
tence, and the etiam, which applies to the words 
taken from the Mass, he would have perceived 
his mistake. But he drew the attention of the read- 
ers to the Christum Agnum Dei salutantes by means 
of a larger type, for fear of their stumbling on those 
two little words. Let, now, the public judge if the 
natural translation of the words be not as follows: — 
^'Who being prostrate at his feet, as if they were 



saluting Christ the Lamb of God before the ara and 
the host, used even those words from the mysteries 
of the altar, (i. e. the Mass), Jgnus Dei^" &c. 

This translation ought to have been evident to a 
Roman Catholic, well acquainted with the ceremony 
to which the writer alludes. The Priest, Mr. B. 
well knows, bending upon the ara^ or consecrated 
slab of marble, which lies in the centre of the altar, 
and looking on the consecrated host, smites his 
breast three times, using these very words, Agnus 
Dei^ &c., and concluding with dona nobis fiacem, — 
Nothing, therefore, can be clearer, than that when the 
ambassadors used these words at the Pope's feet, 
they wished to address them to the Pope himself, 
of whom they came to ask peace, Mr. B. asserts 
that the Pope resiled from the address. Why? If 
the words were directed to Christ, what fault could 
he find in them? He resiled^ because he believed ^ 
the ambassadors to be insincere in their professions 
towards him. 

The whole mistake is so unaccountable, and the 
writer, by copying the original words, has made it 
so palpable, that it seems to stand in the book of 
the R. C. Church to warn the readers of the strong 
bias under which the author labours. 



Since writing the preceding note, it has cost me 
no small trouble to find the passage quoted by Mr. 
Butler. If that gentleman took it from the original, 



2S8 

iie should have mentioned the edition. In that of 
Basle, 1601, the words in question are found at pai^e 
233: Mr. B. refers to page 328. I might have spared 
myself the trouble of a long and tedious search, but 
for a strong suspicion, grounded upon several in- 
stances of Mr. Butler's inaccuracy of quotation, that 
in his transcript of Paulus ^Emilius's words there 
was an additional comrna^ just in the place where it 
may throw some ambiguity on the sense. And sol 
have found it. The original has qui ad pedes illius 
strati^ velut firo ara hostiaque Christum Agnum Dei 
salutantes; evidently connecting the whole sentence 
with the particle of comparison velut, Mr. Butler, 
however, places a comma after hostiaque. It fortu- 
nately happens, however, that the rest of the passage 
betrays the original reading. I must add one word 
more to obviate a possible subterfuge of casuistry. 
Will it be possible that the figure of a semicolon 
used in old editions to denote the abbreviation of the 
que^ in hostiaq; be pleaded in favour of Mr. Butler's 
punctuation? If such a defence should be attempt- 
ed the reader must know, that in the very same 
page of the original work, a comma is placed after 
the mark of abbreviation, whenever the sense re- 
quires it. Thus, in the eighth line from the bot- 
tom, it is written, per nefariam fraudem, furtumq;, 
sed id atrocissimum, Sec. Sec. 



B. — Page 56. 

BOSSUEt's opinion to JAMES lU 

Sur la Declaration du Roi d' Angleterrc* 

La declaration qu'on a demandee an Roi d'Angle- 
terre en faveur de ses sujels Protestants, consiste 
principalement en deux points, 

Le premier est que S. M. t^yovcvqUq, de firoteger et 
defendre PEglise Anglicane comme elle est firesente- 
merit etablie fiar les loix^ et qu^elle assure aux mem' 
bres dHcelle toutes leurs eglises^ universites, colleges^ 
et ecoles^ avec leurs immunites^ droits^ et firivileges. 

Le second que sa dite Majeste promette aussi 
Quelle ne violera fioint le serment du Test^ ni rCen 
disfiensera fioint, 

J'ai repondu et je reponds que S. M. peut aecor- 
der sans difficulte ces deux articles. 

Et pour entendre la raison de cette reponse, il ne 
faut que fixer le sens veritable de deux articles en 
question. 

Le premier a deux parties: L'une de proteger et 
defendre I'Eglise Anglicane comme elle est preseu- 
tement etablie par les loix; ce qui n'emporte autre 
chose que de laisser ces loix dans leur vigeur, et 
comme Roi les executer selon leur forme et teneur. 

La conscience du Roi d'Angleterre, n'est point 
blessee par cette partie de sa declaration, puisque 
la protection et la defense qu'il y promet a TEglise 
S 



23t) 

Anglicane Proteslante ne regarde que rexterieur, 
et n'oblige S. M. a autre chose qu'a laisser cette 
pretendue Eglise dans I'^tat exterieur oil il la trou- 
ve, sans troubler ni permettre qu'on Vy trouble, 

Et pour decider cetie question par principes: il 
faut faire grande difference entre la protection qu'on 
donneroit a une Eglise par adherence aux mauvais 
sentiments qu'elle professe et celle qu'on lui donne 
pour conserver a i'exterieur la tranquillite publique. 
Le premier genre de protection est mauvais parce- 
qu'il a un mauvais principe qui est Tadherence a la 
faussete: mais le second est tres-bon parcequ'il a 
pour principe Tamour de la paix et pour object unc 
chose bonne et necessaire, qui est le repos public. 

Ceux qui traitent en cette occasion avec le Roi 
d'Angleterre ne lui demandent pas Tapprobation de 
la Religion Anglicane, puisqu'au conlraire ils le 
supposent Catholique et traitent avec lui comme 
Tetant: Ils ne lui demandent done qu'une protection 
royale, c'est-a-dire, une protection a Texterieur, 
telle qu'elle convient a un Roi qui ne peut rien sur 
les consciences: et tout le monde demeure d'accord 
que cette protection est legitime et licite. 

Les Rois de France ont bien donne par I'edit de 
Nantes une espece de protection aux preiendus re- 
formes, en les assurant contre les insultes de ceux 
qui les voudroient troubler dans leur exercice, et 
leur accordant des especes de privileges, ou ils or- 
donnent a leurs officiers de les maintenir. On n'a 
pas cru que leur conscience fut interessee dans ces 
concessions, tant qu'elles ont ete jugees necessaircs 



231 

pour le repos public, parceque c'etoit ce repos et 
non pas la religion pretendue reformee qui en etoit 
le motif. On peut dire a proportion la meme chose 
du Roi d'Angleterre, et s'il accorde de plus grands 
avantages a ses sujets Protestants, c'est que I'etat 
ou ils sont dans ses royaumes et le motif du repos 
public I'exige ainsi. 

Aussi ceux qui trouvent a redire a cet endroit de 
Tarticle ne mettent-ils la difficulte qu'en ce qu'ils 
pretendent qu'il enferme une tacite promesse d'exe- 
cuter les lois penales qui sont decernees par les par* 
lements contre les Catholiques: parceque, disent* 
lis, les Protestants mettent dans ces lois penales une 
partie de la protection qu'ils demandent pour I'E- 
glise Anglicane Protestante. 

Mais les paroles dont se sert le Roi n'emportent 
rien de semblable, et il importe de bien comprendre 
comme parle cette declaration! Aows protegerons^ 
dit-elle, et defendrons VEglise Anglicane comme elle 
eet firesentement etablie par les loix, II ne s'agit 
done que des principes constitutifs de cette preten- 
due Eglise en elle-meme, et non pas des lois penales 
par lesquelles elle pretendroit pouvoir repousser les 
religions qui lui sotit opposees. 

Ces principes constitutifs de la religion Angli- 
cane selon les loix du pays sont, lo. les pretendus 
articles de foi regies sous la Reine Elisabeth; 2Q. la 
liturgie approuvee par les parlements, 30. les home- 
lies ou instructions que les memes parlement ont 
autorisees. 

On ne demande point au Roi qu'il se rende le pro- 



333 

inoteur de ees trois choses, mais seulement qu^a 
Texterieur il leur laisse un libre cours pour le repos 
de ses sujets: ce qui suffit d'un cote pour maintenir 
ce qui conslitue a Texterieur TEglise Anglicane 
Prolestante, et de Tautre tie blesse point la con- 
science du Roi. 

Voila done a quoi il s'oblige par cette premiere 
partie du premier article de sa declaration, la deux- 
ieme partie de Panicle oii il promet d'assurer a 
VEglise Protestante et a ses membres leur eglises^ etc., 
a encore moins de difficulte, et meme elle tempera 
la premiere en reduisant manifestement la protec- 
tion et la defense de I'Eglise Anglicane Protestante 
aux choses exterieures dont elle est en possession, 
et dans lesquelles le Roi promet seulement de ne 
souffrir point qu'on la trouble. 

Le Roi est bien eloigne d'approuver par la Tusur- 
pation des Eglises et des benefices; mais il promet 
seulement de ne point permettre que ceux qui les 
ont usurpes soient troubles par des voies de fait, 
parceque cela ne se pourroit faire sans ruiner la 
tranquillite de ses etats. 

A regard du serment du Test^ qui fait le second 
article de la declaration du Roi: II n'oblige S. M. 
a autre chose sinon a exclure des charges publiques 
ceux qui refuseront de faire un certain serment; en 
quoi il n'y a point de difficulte puisqu'on peut vivre 
et humainement et chretiennement sans avor des 
charges. 

Que si cela paroit rude aux Catholiques ils doi- 
vent considerer I'etat ou ils sont, et la petite portion 



233 

qu'ils composent du royaume d'Angleterre, ce qui 
les oblige a n'exiger pas de leur Roi des conditions 
impossibles, et au contraire a sacrifier touts les 
avantages dont ils se pourroient flatter vainement, 
au bien reel et solide d'avoirun Roi deleur religion 
et d'affermir sur le throne sa familie quoique Catho- 
lique,^4pe qui leur peut faire raisonnablement espe- 
rer, sinon d'abord, du moins dans la suite, I'entier 
retablissement de TEglise et de la foy. 

Que si on s'attache au contraire a vouloir faire la 
loi aux Protestants qui sont les maitres, on perdra 
avec Toccasign de retablir le Roi, non seulenient 
touts les avantages qui sont attaches a ce retablisse- 
ment, mais encore touts les autres quels qu'ils soient, 
et on s'exposera a toutes sortes de maux, etant bien 
certain que si les rebelles viennent a bout selon leurs 
desirs d'exclure tout a fait le Roi, ils ne garderont 
aucune mesure envers les CathoUques, et ne songe- 
ront qu' a assouvir la haine qu'ils leur portent. 

Pour ces raisons je conclus non seulement que le 
Roi a pu en conscience faire la declaration dont il 
s'agit, mais encore qu'il y etoit oblige, parcequ'ii 
doit faire tout ce qui est possible pour I'avantage 
de I'Eglise et de ses sujets Catholiques auxquels 
rien ne peut-etre meilleur dans la conjuncture pre- 
sente que son retablissement. 

On doit meme deja regarder comme un grand 
avantage la declaration qui fait S. M de recomman'* 
der fortement a son parlement une imfiartiale liberti 
de conscience^ ce qui montre le zele de ce Prince pour 
le repos de ses sujets Catholiques^ et tout easemble 
S £ 



234 

une favorable disposition pour eiix dans ses sujet 
Protestants qui acceptent sa declaration, 

Je dirai done volontiers aux Catholiques, s'il y en 
a qui n'approuvent pas la declaration dont il s'agit: 
JSToli esse Justus multum: ncque filus sa/iias quamne* 
cesse est J 7ie obstu/iescas. Ecc. vii. 17. 

Je ne doute point que N. S. P. le Pape ft'appuie 
le Roi d'Angleterre dans Texecution d'une declara- 
tion qui etoit si necessaire et ne juge bien des inten- 
tions d'un Prince qui a sacrifie trois royaumes, toute 
sa famille, et sa propre vie, a la religion Catholique. 
Je me soumet, neanmoins, de tout mon coeur a la 
supreme decision de S. S. 

Fait a Meaux, ce 22 May, 1693. 

t J. Benigtie, E de Meaux. 

This opinion was to have been laid before the 
Pope through Cardinal de Janson Forbin, to whom 
both Bossuet and Lord Melfort wrote for that pur- 
pose. But neither the letters nor the opinion were 
forwarded to Rome by Louis XIV. 

The postscript in Lord Melfort's own hand is 
very curious. The errors of language are scrupu- 
lously preserved. 

" Ce qu'il y a affaire n'est que pour eviter les 
CENSURES de Rome, non pas pour faire examiner 
I'affaire, ce qu'u. faut eviter et principalement 
LEs congregations, ce que sa Majeste souhaite cs- 
tant de satisfaire sa Saintete en particulier des ne- 
cessities soubs les quelles sa Majeste est tant a 
regard 4le son ^stablissement que pour avoir la li- 



335 

berte de faire elever le Prince de Galles dans la re* 
ligion Catholique, ce qui est un plus grand bien k 
la dit religion que aucun autre que puisse arriver^ 
II est aussi a considerer que sa Majeste a des assu- 
rances des principaux avec lesquelles elle a traite 
d'obtenir une liberte de conscience pour les Catbo- 
liques d'Angleterre, pourveu que sa Majeste ne le 
presse pas par son authorite, mais qu'il le laisse au 
Parliament. En fin celle cy j'entends la declara- 
tion n'est que pour rentrer, et l'on peut beau- 
coup MIEUX DISPVTER DES AFFAIRES DES CATHOLiqUES 

A Whitehall qu'a St. Germain." — lb. p. 390. 



C — Page 76. 

\LPH0NS0 de CASTRO, AND THE FOURTH COUNCIL C^ 
TOLEDO. 

The task of defending the Roman Catholic 
Church from the charge of intolerance and persecu- 
tion involves Mr. Butler in strange difficulties, and 
calls forth that light, skimming, glancing manner 
of arguing which distinguishes that writer, and 
must make him a great favourite with the fair read- 
ers of his party. I dislike historical more than 
any other controversy, and have purposely abstained 
in the preceding pages from every topic that could 
lead me into the labyrinth of contradictory authori- 
ties where truth lies cbncealed, especially on points 



236 

of ecclesiastical history. But as Mr. Butler has, by 
the way, discovered two hitherto unknown phenom- 
ena, a tolerant Spanish friar and a liberal Spanish 
Council, I, as a Spaniard, cannot pass these wonders 
unnoticed. 

"It should not be forgotten," says Mr. Butler,* 
"that Alphonsus de Castro, a Spanish friar and con- 
fessor to Philip, in a sermon preached before the 
court, condemned these proceedings (the sanguinary 
persecutions of Mary) in the most pointed manner, 
as contrary both to the text and the spirit of the 
gospel." He said "that it was not by severity but 
by mildness that men were to be brought into the 
fold of Christ; and that it was not the duty of 
bishops to seek the death, but to instruct the ignor- 
ance of their misguided brethren." — "Many," says 
Dr. Lingard, "were at a loss to account for the dis- 
course; whether it was the spontaneous effort of the 
friar, or had been suggested to him by the policy of 
Philip, or by the humanity of Cardinal Pole, or by 
the repugnance of the bishops — it made however a 
deep impression. The preacher was afterwards ad- 
vanced to a bishopric in Spain." 

This is a remarkable specimen of the art of weak- 
ening strong impressions by a crowd of new ones, 
vague, indffinite, and discordant. It is analogous 
\(I beg my readers to pardon the homeliness of the 
illustration) to the mode in which rubbing and 
scratching in every direction, relieve some deep 

* Page 203, Isted. 



237 

sensations of the skin. Four suppositions are sug^- 
gested to account for the fact that a Spanish friar 
p.reached toleration in London under the sanguinary 
Mary. The reader, of course, will not stop to choose 
among them. He then finds that the sermon "made 
a deep impression," and the friar was advanced to a 
bishopric in Spain: the consequence is that whereas 
he formerly believed that Spanish friars were the 
most horrible persecutors, he must now suspend his 
judgment; and who knows, but he may feel inclined 
to think that the shortest cut to a Spanish bishopric 
is a sermon on toleration? 

But who was this mild, goodnatured friar*— this 
Alphonsus de Castro? 

Nicholas Antonia, in his Bibliotheca HiBfiana JSfovay 
gives a pretty long article about him, of which 
I will only copy the notice of one of this meek friar*s 
works. 

^^De junta Hcdreticorum fiuiiitione^ libri tres. Sal- 
manticae, 1547, in fol. ex officina Joannis Giuntae. 
Lugduni, 1556, in 8, apud hasredes Jacobi Junctae, 
Antuerpiae apud Steelsii hseredes 1568 in 8. ut con- 
Jirmaret justas esse cmnes illas pdenas^ qiiihus injure 
civili atque canonico hcsritici addicuntur,^' 

Such was the man that proclaimed forbearance 
from the pulpit, in the presence of those two notori- 
ous tyrants, Philip and Mary. He, indeed, exhibits 
one of the numerous instances of that mixed spirit 
of fierce intolerance, and accommodating casuistry, 
to which men grow prone under the tuition of Popes 
and Cardinals. It was certainly not the spirit of 



338 

Christian meekness that produced the extraordinary 
contradiction which appears between Castro's 
works, in Spain, and his sermon, in London; but the 
same ambitious views of Philip, which made him 
endeavour to acquire popularity by protecting the 
Lady Elizabeth from the spile of the Queen, and by 
procuring the release of Lord Henry Dudley, Sir 
George Harper, Sir Nicholas Throgmorton, and 
many others, who, as Hume observes, had been con- 
fined, from the suspicions or resentments of the 
court. 

I have, in the next place, to show the true charac- 
ter of that liberal Council of Toledo, whose open 
profession of toleratioh is so triumphantly adduced 
fey the advocate of the Roman Catholic church. 
^*The fourth Council of Toledo had declared,'* says 
Mr. Butler, "that it was unlawful and unchristian- 
like to force people to believe, seeing it is God 
alone who hardens and shows mercy to whom he 
will." A noble declaration, indeed, to come from 
the seat of one of the Spanish inquisitions! But 
when did this humane Council meet, and what was 
its general character? Did it apply this broad 
principle to every dissenting sect? Did it really an- 
ticipate the Protestants in the recognition of the 
right o{ fir iv ate judgment in matters of faith? Our 
author will not deprive his cause of the chance that 
his readers will answer all these questions in the 
sense most favourable to the object for which the 
quotation is made. I will, however, deal more ex- 
plicitly upon these points 



^39 

The fourth Council of Toledo was held in the 
year of our Lord, 634, Mariana, the Spanish his- 
torian, says that Sisenand (an usurper who, with the 
aid of Dagobert, king of France, had deposed Swin- 
thila) "convened from all parts of his dominions 
about seventy bishops, at Toledo, under colour of 
reforming the morals of the ecclesiastics, which the 
troubles of the times had greatly depraved; but with 
the real object that the fathers should condemn 
Swinthila, as unworthy of the crown, and by this 
means, both his open followers and secret friends 
might be made to change their minds and be 
quiet."* It is probable that this holy council, find- 
ing it necessary to allay the alarm of the Jews, 
whose wealth was for many centuries the best re- 
source of the Spanish kings, was induced to pass the 
decree in their favour^ which Mr. Butler gives us as 
an unlimited declaration in behalf of all dissenters 
from the Church of Rome. Numbers of that per- 
secuted people had been forced to receive baptism 
by a law of Sisebute. This law alone is repealed 
by the fourth Council of Toledo. Had Mr. Butler 
either read the original decrees, or wished to state 
the whole matter without curtailment, the character 
of his church would have gained little from the 
liberality of the Toletan fathers. Indeed the same 
canon of the Council, which favours the world with 
the comprehensive principles of toleration which 
have been adduced as a parallel to the most liberal 

* Meriana, Book yi. c, 5* 



§40 

concessions of the Protestants on that point, declares 
thai the Jeivs who were bafitized by force should be 
compelled to the observance of Christianity. I will 
subjoin the whole decree: 

Canon. 55, ^'De Judxis autem hoc praecepit sancta 
synodus nemini deinceps ad credenduni vim inferre. 
Cui enim vult Deus miseretur, et quern vult indtirat. 
Non enim tales inviti salvandi sunt, sed volentes, ut 
Integra sit forma justiti^e. Sicut enim homo pro- 
pria arbitrii voluntate surpenti obediens, periit sic 
(vocante se gratia Dei) propriae mentis conversione 
quisque credendo, salvatur. Ergo non vi, sed libera 
arbitrii facultate ut convertantur suadendi sunt non 
potius impellendi. Qui autemjam pridem ad Chris- 
tianitatem venire coa ti sunt (sicut factum est temfiori- 
bus religiosissimi firincifiis SisebutiJ quia jam constat 
€0s sacramentis divinis associatos^ et bafitismi graiain 
susce/iisse^ et Chrismate unctos esse^ et corporis Domini^ 
€t sanguinis extitisse fiarticijies; ofiortet utjidem etiam 

qUAM VI VEL NECESSITATE SUSCEPERUNT tCUCre COgaU' 

tur^ ne nomen Domini blasfihemetur; et Jides quam 
suscefierunt contem/itibilis habeatur.''* 

But I have in reserve a string of tender mercies, 

* The Spaniard, Carranza, not satisfied with the inquisi- 
torial force authorized by the latter part of this canon, took 
care to omit, in his Summa Concilioriiniy the words, "Ergo 
non vi, sed libera arbitrii facultate ut convertantur suadendi 
sunt, non potius impellendi." Yet Carranza himsetf was sus- 
pected and imprisoned by the Inquisition. My tanscript of 
this and following" canons is from the Collection of the Jesuits^ 
Labbe and Gossart, vol. v. p. 1720. 



241 

such as flowed from the tolerant principle of the 
liberal Council of Toledo. They are recorded in 
the same page with the proclamation of mental 
freedom, by which the apologist of Rome has stop- 
ped the mouths of those who charge his church 
with intolerance. 

The models of Roman Catholic liberality, having 
in the 55th canon forbidden the Jews, baptized by 
force, to return to their religion, proceed in the 
60th to provide for the spiritual safety of children 
boiTt of unconverted parents, from whom they are 
directed to be taken away and placed in convents, 
Judaeorum Jilios vel Jilias^ ne fiarentum ultro invoU 
"oantur erroribus^ ah eorum consortio se/iaraiH decernU 
mus. The forced converts are then made the ob- 
jects of the Council's anxiety. To prevent the se- 
cret exercise of their national practices, all inter- 
course between them and their unconverted bre- 
thren is made punishable, by making the unbap- 
tized parties slaves to the Christians, and putting 
the offending neophytes to death. iN'ulla igitur uU 
tra communio sit Hebrcis adfidem Christianam trans» 
latis^ cum his qui adhuc in vetere ritu consistunt; ne 
forte eorum fiarticijiatione subvert ant ur. Quicum* 
que igitur amodo ex his qui bafitizati sunt^ injidelium 
consortia non vitaverint; et hi Christiania donentur^ 
et illi/iublicis ccsdibus de/iutentur. Finally, the 63d 
canon orders that Jews married to Christian wo- 
men be divorced from their wives, unless they sub* 
mit to be baptized. 

There is a sacred duty incumbent on every man 
T 



S4a 

who appears as an author before the public, which 
the writer of the Book of the Roman Catholic Church 
has, I fear, often overlooked in his work; but sel- 
dom more openly than in the present instance.— 
The best excuse is, that the apologist of Rome has 
copied from others; but dishonesty lies somewhere: 
the garbled statement comes, no doubt, from among 
the writers of the Roman Catholic communion who 
have lately appeared before the British public. — 
Am I not therefore justified in earnestly saying to 
that public— Beware! 



D — Page 89- 

tRANSUBSTANTIATIOSf. 

An accurate and detailed history of the rise and 
gradual progress of the doctrine of Tran substan- 
tiation, would be a valuable contribution to the 
philosophy of the human mind. What appears to 
me most deserving the attention of philosophical 
observers, is the concurrence of two perfectly un- 
connected errors, in giving birth to this intellectual 
monster. 

The natural propensity of mankind to refer 
their worship of the invisible to the symbols em- 
ployed to express it, is found even among the early- 
Christians. A great reverence for the bread and 
wine, which| in the words of the Saviour, were call- 



243 

ed his flesh and blood, far from being to blame in 
them, must be viewed as a direct consequence of 
the certainty they possessed, that the Eucharist 
had been established by the Son of God. But here 
the usual process of the vulgar mind began. Ab- 
stractions and distinctions are difficult and painful 
to the generality of mankind. The spiritual, pre- 
sence of Christ, the intimate connexion between an 
external and simple act of eating and drinking, and 
the influence of his grace on the soul of those who 
eat and drink by faith in his death and passion, 
was soon lost sight of. Though Christ himself 
had declared that '*ihe flesh profiteth nothing," the 
bread and wine gradually assumed the character of 
his material flesh and blood. Yet neither the peo- 
ple nor their leaders were able to use any definite 
language upon the mysterious work of consecration. 
It happened, however, in the metaphysical ages 
(such name, I believe, would suit the period be- 
tween the twelfth and the sixteenth centuries) that 
every system which successively occupied the at* 
tention of the schools, had an effect not unlike that 
which is now produced by physical discoveries, 
though upon very dissimilar objects. A newly dis- 
covered law or power of nature, in our days, puts 
the whole mass of European intellect into motion; 
a thousand applications are tried, ten thousand 
hopes of improvement are raised, till the efferve- 
scence is sobered down by experience and failure. 
A new metaphysical system produced in those 
times a similar state of mind, among the class who 



244 

pursued abstract knowledge, with regard to the ob- 
jects of their favourite studies, and that without 
any thing to check it. Platonism first, and then 
Aristotle ism, were believed to be sufficient to ex- 
plain every mystery in theology. The success, 
however, of the latter was unrivalled in defining, 
explaining, and demonstrating the as yet indistinct 
and fluctuating theory of the Eucharist. 

One of the doctrines introduced by the Aristote- 
lian system of the school, is that of substantial forms, 
or absolute accidents* The schoolmen suppose 
that the universe consists of a mass of matter, in- 
vested by certain forms or qualities, which possess 
a real and substantial being. This was a lucky dis- 
covery for the school divines. It explained the bo- 
dily presence of Christ in the sacrament. The sub- 
stance of the bread and wine, they said, is converted 
into his body and blood; but the absolute accidents^ 
the substantial forms of both, remain as before.-— 
Hence the word transubstantiation. 

The idea of a general mass shaped by these «m3- 
stantial forms or moulds, is so agreeable to the ex- 
ternal impressions of mankind, and so analogous to 
the operations by which what we call materials are 
converted into objects fitted for peculiar uses; that 

* The schoolmen have foisted many of their absurdities 
upon the Greek philosopher. J>om the definition which 
Aristotle gives of matter, it is evident that he considered 
that word as the sign of an abstraction. "Materia est neque 
quid, neque quantum, nee aliud eorum quibus ens denomi- 
natur." I quote the translation used among the schoolmen 



243 

the words in which the school philosophers ex- 
pressed them, have been incorporated with all the 
European languages.* 

That the doctrine of transubstantiaiion could not 
have been established without the aid of Aristotle, 
any one who examines the technical words of the 
Roman Catholic divines upon that question, will 
readily perceive. Of this they were so fully con- 
vinced but a short time ago, that I recollect the 
opposition to which the modern system of natural 
philosophy was still subject in my youth, as de- 
priving the Roman Catholic faith of its chief sup- 
port, by the rejection of the substantial forms. In- 
deed transubstantiation conveys either no meaning 
at all, or one entirely the reverse of what Rome in- 
tends; unless we suppose the separableness oi sub- 
stance^ and forms or qualities. The substance of 
the bread and wine, it is said, is converted into the 
body and blood of Christ; which, translated into 
any language but that of the schools means that 
the body of Christ (I wish to speak reverently,) 

* It is curious to trace to the same source even the word 
elements^ which seems to have been chosen by the Protes- 
tants as the most independent from the theory of transub- 
stantiation. Elemerits is another scholastic name for that 
substratum which is conceived to bear the qualities of things. 
"Omnium elementa possunt invicem in se transmutari, non 
generatione, sed alteratione." The bread and wine were 
elements, because they were supposed to be changed into 
the body and blood of Christ. See Brucker, Hist. Fhilos, 
Part II. Lib. II. c. vii. 

T 2 



246 

chemically analyzed in the consecrated bread and 
wine, will be found to consist of every thin^ that 
constitutes bread and wine: z. e. the body and blood 
of Christ will be found to have been converted into 
real bread and wine. What else do we designate 
by bread and by wine, but two aggregates of quali- 
ties, identical to what the analytical process will 
show after consecration? Substance without quali- 
ties is a mere abstraction of the mind; with quali- 
ties, it is that which the qualities make it. So 
here we have a mighty -miracle to convert Christ 
into bread and wine; for such" would be the sub- 
stance of his body and blood if it changed its quali- 
ties for those of the two well known compounds 
Which the Roman Catholics adore. If it is said 
that Christ occupies the place of the bread and wine, 
and produces the impressions peculiar to them on 
the senses, the supposed miracle should change the 
name of transubstantiation into that of delusion.-^' 
Surely transubstantiation has for its basis the most 
absurd philosophical system which ever disgraced 
the schools of a barbarous age! 



E.— Page 106- 

I3^NCERTAIx\TY OF ROMAN CATHOLIC INFALLIBILITY, 

Nothing can be more certain than the uncer- 
tainty of the Roman Catholic Church, as to the seat 



S47 

and source of her pretended infallibility. If any 
thijTg can be deduced from the vague and unsettled 
principles of her divines, on this subject, it would 
appear that infallibility finally resolves itself into the 
authority of the Pope. For, as no council whatever 
is deemed infallible till the Pope has sanctioned its 
decrees, the pretended assistance from heaven must 
apply to that discriminating oracle, on whose de- 
cision the supernatural authority of the councils de- 
pends. 

The opening speech of the papal legates who pre- 
sided at the council of Trent represents the expect- 
ed inspiration as conditional; a very natural caution 
in the representatives of that see, which has always 
most strenuously opposed the notion that the Pope 
is inferior to a general council. After a candid 
acknowledgment of the enormous corruptions of 
the Roman Catholic clergy, which the reader will 
find hereafter, the legates speak of the expected in- 
spiration in the following words: — 

"Quare nisi ille spiritus nos apud nos metipsos 
primum condemnaverit, nondum ilium ingressum 
esse ad nos afiirmare possumus, ac ne ingressurum 
quidem, si peccata nostra audire recusamus. Idem 
enim dicetur nobis, quod populo veteri per prophe- 
tam Ezechielem est dictum, cum nondum agnitis 
suis sceleribus, Dominum per prophetam interro- 
gare vellent. Venerunt viri Israel ad interrogandum 
Dominum^ et sederunt coram me, Hcec autem dicit 
Dominus: numquid ad i7iterrogandum me venistis? 
Vivo egOy dicit Dominus^ quia non resfiondebo vobis. 



248 

Sequitur autem, sijudicas eos^ abominationes fiatrum 
illorum ostende illis. In quibus verbis ostendit Deus, 
quarc noluerit respondere illis, quia nondum scilicet 
abominationes suas et patrunn suorum audierant. 
Quare cum idem Dei Spiritus sit, qui tunc dabat 
responsa, et quern nunc nos sedentes coram Domino 
invocamus, quid nobis faciendum sit, ut propria re- 
sponsa habeamus, ex his videtis Quia vero non- 

nullos nunc videmus, sua primum peccata, et nostri 
ordinis graviter deflentes, atque Dei misericordiam 
omnibus votis implorantes, ideo quidem in maxima 
afie 5wm«5, advenisse, quem invocamus, Dei Spirit- 
um/' — Concilia per Labbeum et Gossartium, Tom. 
XIV. p. 738. 

It is clear that the legates grounded their hopes 
of inspiration for the Council, on the marks of re- 
pentance which they perceived in some of its mem- 
bers. Must then Roman Catholics ascertain the 
spiritual condition of their oracles, before they ad- 
mit them to the privilege of infallibility? It should 
seem, however, that the Popes are not subject to 
such restrictions in the use of their infallible sanc- 
tion; else, a man with the moral tact of Alexander 
VI. would have been subject to strange mistakes, in 
calculating the fitness of the bishops in council, to 
receive an inspiration totally dependent on moral 
character. 



249 



F — Page 133. 

CASE OF A SPANISH PROTESTANT PRIEST, IMPRISONED BY 
THE INQUISITION IN 1802. 

Since the execution of the unhappy woman whose 
death I mention in the 5th Letter, the Spanish In- 
quisitors seemed less disposed to shed blood. It is 
also true that men were also much more averse to 
sacrifice their lives to their relig'ious views, than at 
the time of the Reformation. Spain, which in the 
16th century gave a host of martyrs to Protestant 
Christianity*, has, of late, produced but one instance 
of the power of the Scriptures "in an honest and 
good heart." This most interesting case is related 
by the secretary of the Inquisition of Madrid, Llo- 
rente, in his History of the Spanish Inquisition, 
Vol. IV. p. 127. 

Don Miguel Juan Antonio Solano, a native of 
Verdun, in Arragon, was vicar of Esco, in the dio- 
cess of Jaca. His benevolence and exemplary con- 
duct endeared him to his parishioners. Though 
educated according to the Aristotelian system, and 
the school divinity, which was very lately preva^ 
lent at many of the Spanish universities; the natur- 
al strength of his mind led him to study pure ma^ 

* See Art. 9 of No. 57 of the Quarterly Bevieiv, in which 
the author of the present work ^^ave an account of the Span- 
ish Reformers, knd their sufferings. 



350 

ihematics, and mechanics, by himself. The good- 
ness of his heart combined with his inventive tal- 
ents in the work of fertilizing a dale, or rather a 
mere ravine, belonging to the inhabitants of his 
parish, which lay waste for want of irrigation.— 
Without any help from the government, and with 
no mechanical means but the spades of the pea- 
sants, he succeeded in diverting the waters of a 
mountain streamlet upon the slip of vegetable soil 
which had been deposited in the glen. 

A long and severe illness, which made him a 
t:ripple for life, withdrew the good vicar of Esco 
from these active pursuits, and limited his employ- 
ment to the perusal of the few books which his lit- 
tle library afforded. Fortunately the Bible was one 
of them. Solano read the records of revelation 
with a sincere desire to embrace religious truth, 
as he found it there; and having gradually cleared 
and arranged his views, drew up a little system of 
divinity, which agreed in the main points with the 
fundamental tenets of the Protestant churches. His 
conviction of the Roman Catholic errors became 
so strong, that he determined to lay his book be- 
fore the bishop of the diocess, asking his pastoral 
help and advice upon that most important subject. 
An answer to his arguments was promised; but 
despairing after a lapse of time to obtain it, Solano 
applied to the faculty of divinity of the University 
of Saragossa. The reverend doctors sent the book 
to the Inquisition, and the infirm vicar of Esco was 
lodged in the prisons of the holy tribunal of Sara- 



25i 

gossa. This happened in 1802. It seems that 
some humane persons contrived his escape soon 
after, and conveyed him to Oleron, the nearest 
French town. But Solano, having taken time to 
consider his case, came to the heroic resolution of 
asserting the truth in the very face of death; and 
returned of his own accord to the inquisitorial pri- 
sons. 

The Inquisitor General, at that time, was Arce, 
archbishop of Santiago, an intimate friend of the 
Prince of Peace; and one strongly suspected of se- 
cret infidelity. When the sentence of the Arago- 
nese tribunal, condemning Solano to die by fire, 
was presented to the supreme court for confirma- 
tion, Arce, shocked at the idea of an auto-da-fe, 
contrived every method to delay the execution. A 
fresh examination of witnesses was ordered; during 
which the inquisitors entreated Solano to avert his 
now imminent danger. Nothing, however, could 
move him. He said he well knew the death that 
awaited him; but no human fear would ever make 
him swerve from the truth. The first sentence be- 
ing confirmed, nothing remained but iht exequatur 
of the sufireme, Arce, however, suspended it, and 
ordered an inquiry into the mental sanity of the pri- 
soner. As nothing appeared to support this plea, 
Solano would have died at the stake, had not Pro- 
vidence snatched him from the hands of the papal 
defenders of the faith. A dangerous illness seized 
him in the prison, where he had lingered three 
years. The efforts to convert him were, on this oc- 



casioTi, renewed with increased ardour. "The in- 
quisitors," says Llorente, "gave it in charge to the 
most able divines of Saragossa to reclaim Solano; 
and even requested Don Miguel Suarez de Santan- 
der, auxiliary bishop of that town, and apostolic 
missionary (now, like myself, a refugee in France), 
to exhort him, with all the tenderness and goodness 
of a Christian nninister, which are so natural to that 
worthy prelate. The vicar showed a grateful sense 
of all that was done for him; but declared that he 
could not renounce his religious persuasion without 
offending God by acting treacherously against the 
truth. On the twenty-first day of his illness, the 
physician warned him of approaching death, urg- 
ing him to improve the short time which he had to 
live. 'I am in the hands of God," answered Solano, 
^and have nothing else to do.' Thus died, in 1805, 
the vicar of Esco. He was denied Christian burial, 
and his body privately interred within the inclosure 
of the Inquisition, near the back gate of the build- 
ing, towards the Ebro. The inquisitors reported 
all that had taken place to the supreme tribunal, 
whose members approved their conduct, and stopt 
further proceedings, in order to avoid the necessity 
<^f burning the deceased, in effigy." 



H — Page 137. 

The account of nuns and friars which Erasmus 
gives in the dialogue from which I borrowed the 



S53 

passage in the text, so perfectly agrees with all I 
know of them — the arts by which girls are now 
drawn into monasteries are so similar to those 
which he describes — and the reasons he uses to 
dissuade the young enthusiast from sacrificing her 
liberty, are so applicable to every case of that kind 
in our days, that I hope the reader will pardon me 
for inserting the whole dialogue, in the elegant 
translation of my excellent friend the Rev. Robert 
Butler; to whom I am also indebted for the follow- 
ing notice of the alarm which those delightful 
compositions, the Colloquies, excited in the Uni- 
versity of Paris. 

"The faculty of theology passed a general cen- 
sure in 1526 upon the Colloquies of Erasmus, as 
upon a work in which the fasts and abstinences of 
the Church of Rome are slighted, the suffrages of 
the Holy Virgin and of the saints are derided, vir- 
ginity is set below matrimony. Christians are dis- 
couraged from monkery, and grammatical is pre- 
ferred to theological erudition. Therefore, it is 
decreed that the perusal of this wicked book be 
forbidden to all, more especially to young folks; 
and that it be entirely suppressed if it be possible.** 
From Dufiin^ as quoted in Jortin^s History of Erasm 
mus, Fol. Lfi. 298. 



u 



234 



Erasmus's dialogue, entitled virgo MiSOFAMOS, 
or the marriage-hating maiden. 

£ubulus.'^ Catharine, 

Eu. I rejoice that dinner is at last over, and that 
we are at leisure to enjoy this delightful walk. 

Ca. It was quite wearisome to sit so long at ta- 
ble. 

Eu. How every thing smiles around us! Truly 
this is the very youth and spring-time of the world. 

Ca. It is so, indeed! 

Eu. And why is it not with thee also the spring- 
time of smiles and joy? 

Ca. Wherefore do you ask such a question? 

Eu. Because I perceive a sadness in your coun- 
tenance. 

Ca. Are my looks then different from what they 
are wont to be? 

Eu. Would you like me to show you to yourself? 

Ca. Of all things. 

Eu. You see this rose. Observe how, as the night 
approaches, it contracts its leaves. 

Ca. Well ! and what then ? 

Eu. It thus presents you with an image of your 
own countenance. 

Ca. a most excellent comparison! 

Eu. If you will not believe me, look at yourself 
in this little fountain. Those frequent sighs, too, 
during dinner*— tell me what could be the meaning 
oC them? 



255 

Ca. Question me no farther. The subject is one 
in which you are not concerned. 

Eu. Nay, Catharine: it cannot but concern one 
whose happiness is bound up in thine. Another 
sigh? Alas! how deeply drawn! 

Ca. My mind is in a state of great anxiety; but I 
cannot safely mention the cause. 

Eu. What! not even to him who loves thee better 
than he loves his own sister? Fear not, dearest Ca- 
tharine; let the secret of thy affliction be what it 
may, rest assured that it is safe in my keeping. 

Ca. That may be; but I should tell it to one who 
would give me no assistance. 

Eu. How know you that? I might, at least, have 
it in my power to aid you by advice and consolation. 

Ca. I cannot tell. 

Eu. How is this? You hate me, then, Catharine; 

Ca* Yes; if I can hate my own brother; and yet I 
cannot bring myself to tell thee. 

Eu. Should I be able to guess the cause of your 
suffering, will you confess it? Nay, do not turn 
away: promise me, or else I will never cease to im- 
portune thee. 

Ca, Well, I promise. 

Eu. I do not at all understand what can be want- 
ing to make you perfectly happy. 

Ca. O that my condition were really such as you 
conceive it to be! 

Eu. In the first place, you are in the flower of 
your age; for if I mistake not, you are now in your 
seventeenth year. 



256 

Ca. Just so. 

Eu. The apprehension, then, of old age cannot, 
1 suppose, be the source of your trouble? 

Ca. Nothing in the world troubles me less. 

Eu. You have a form that is perfect in every part; 
and this is one of God's chief gifts. 

Ca. Of my form, such as it is, I neither boast nor 
complain. 

Ev. Then your colour and habit of body indicate 
that you are in sound health — unless indeed you 
carry about you some secret disease. 

Ca. Nothing of the kind, I thank God. 

Eu. Your character, moreover, is unspotted. 

Ca. I trust so. 

Eu. You have a mind also worthy of the body 
wherein it dwells; a mind of the happiest disposi- 
tion, and as apt as I could desire for every liberal 
pursuit and study. 

Ca. Whatever it may be, it is the gift of God. 

Eu. Neither is there any want of that loveliest 
grace of moral excellence, the absence of which is 
too often to be regretted in forms of the most per- 
fect beauty. 

Ca. It is certainly my desire that my behaviour 
should be such as becomes my situation, 

Eu. Many are dejected in mind on account of the 
infelicity of their birth; but you, on the contrary, 
have parents of honourable descent and of virtuous 
manners — possessed also of an ample fortune, and 
attached to you with the fondest affection. 

Ca. I have nothing, in this respect, to complain 
of. 



257 

Eu. In a word, of all the maidens in this neigh- 
bourhood there is not one (were some propitioirs 
star to shine upon me) whom I would choose for a 
wife hut thee. 

Ca. And I, if I had any wish to marry, would de- 
sire no other husband than thyself. 

Eu. Surely then it must be something very extra- 
ordinary which can occasion you so much trouble? 

Ca. Something of no light moment, be assured. 

Eu. Will you not take it ill if I divine what it is? 

Ca. I have already promised not to do so. 

Eu. Well then, experience has taught me what 
pain there is in love. Come, confess, according to 
your promise. 

Ca. To say the truth, love is the cause; but not 
the kind of love you mean, 

Eu. What kind then? 

Ca. Divine love. 

Eu. I have done; my stock of conjecture is ex«^ 
hausted: and yet I will not let go this hand of thine 
till I wrest thy secret from thee. 

Ca. How violent you are! 

Eu. Only confide it ta me, whatever it may be. 

Ca. Well, since you are so very urgent about it, 
I will tell you. Know then, that from my tenderest 
years a passion of an extraordinary nature has pos^ 
sessed me. 

Eu. What can it be? to become a nun? 

Ca. Just so* 

Eu. Hem! I have gained a loss! 

Ca. What is it you say, Eubulus? 
U2 



258 

Eu. Nothing, my love: I only coughed. Go on, 
I pray you. 

Ca. The desire I have mentioned to you was al- 
ways opposed by my parents with the greatest per- 
tinacity. 
Eu. I understand. 

Ca. On the other hand, I for my part, never ceas- 
ed to besiege their affection with entreaties, cares- 
ses, and tears. 

Eu. You surprise me. 

Ca. At length my perseverance in this course so 
far prevailed upon them, that they promised that, 
if I should continue in the same mind upon my en- 
tering into my seventeenth year, they would then 
yield to my wishes: that year is now arrived; my 
desire remains unchanged; and yet, in opposition 
to their promise, they positively refuse to gratify 
it: this it is that troubles me. I have now disclos- 
ed to you the nature of my disease: prescribe the 
remedy, if you have any. 

Eu. In the first place, let me counsel you, sweet- 
est maiden, to moderate your desires; and if you 
cannot obtain what you would, to wish for no more 
than what may be in your power to obtain. 

Ca, I shall die if I do not obtain the present ob- 
ject of my wishes. 

Eu. But what could have given rise to this fatal 
passion? 

Ca. Some years ago, when quite a girl, I was ta- 
ken into a convent, where they led me about and 
showed me every thing. I was charmed with the 



259 

sweet looks of the nuns, who seemed to me like so 
many angels; and was delighted with the beautiful 
appearance of every thing in the chapel, and with 
the fragrance and pleasantness of gardens dressed 
and cultivated with the nicest art. In short, which- 
ever way I turned my eyes, every thing smiled up- 
on me. Add to this, the pleasant conversation I 
had with the nuns themselves, some of whom I dis- 
covered to have been my playfellows during my 
childhood. From this period it was that I conceiv- 
ed the ardent desire I have to adopt the same kind 
of life. 

Eu. It certainly is not my intention to reprobate 
the institution of nunneries,* though the same 
things are not of equal advantage to all; and yet, 
from my opinion of the nature of your disposition, 
iSuch as it appears to me from your countenance 
and manners, my advice to you would be, to marry 
a husband of a character similar to your own, and 
thus give rise to a new society at home, of which 
your husband should be the father, and yourself 
the mother. 

Ca. I will rather die than give up my purpose. 

Eu. A virgin life, if purity attend it, is no doubt 
an excellent thing; but it does not require you so to 
bind yourself to a particular convent, as to be una- 
ble afterwards to leave it. Surely, you may live at 

* "... Mihi aliud dictabat animus, aliud scribebat calamus," 
is the melancholy acknowledgment which Erasmus made 
of his own want of courage. 



260 

home with your parents, and preserve at the san>e 
time your virgin honour? 

Ca. True; but not with equal safety. 

Eu. In my opinion you will preserve it there 
much more securely than amongst so many fat and 
bloated monks: — fathers they are called, and fathers 
they not unfrequently are, in more senses than one. 
Remember also, that in former tim.es young maid- 
ens were considered to live nowhere more honour- 
ably than at home with their parents; nor had they 
any father, according to the religious sense of the 
word, except the bishop. But tell me, I beseech 
you, what nunnery is it that you have fixed upon 
as the place of your servitude and seclusion? 

Ca. The Chrysertian, 

Eu. I know it. It is close to your father's house» 

Ca. Just so. 

Eu. And well, too, do I know the whole of the 
worthy fraternity for which you would give up fa- 
ther and mother and the excellent family to which 
you are related. As for the patriarch of this 
venerable society, he has long been foolish, both 
from infirmities of age and nature, and from indul- 
gence in the pleasures of the table. His knowl- 
edge is now confined to his bottle. He has two 
companions, John and Jodocus, both warthy of 
him. John, though not perhaps a bad man, has 
nevertheless nothing of the man about him but his 
beard — not one grain of learning, and a very slen- 
der stock of prudence. As for Jodocus, he is so 
stupid, that, if it were not for the recommendation 



^61 

of his sacred dress, he might walk about in public, 
in the cap and bells of a fool. 

Ca. They seem to me, however, to be very good 
men. 

Eu. My dear Catharine, I know them better than 
you can do. But I suppose that these are your 
patrons with your father and mother; — the persons 
who would make you their proselyte? 

Ca. Jodocus is very favourable to my wishes. 

Eu. Oh! worthy patron! But let it be granted 
that these men are now both learned and good, it 
will not be long before you will find them both ig- 
norant and wicked; and you will, moreover, have to 
bear with every one that meets you. 

Ca. The frequent entertainments that are given 
at home are very disagreeable to me; nor is every 
thing that is spoken there between those who are 
married, such as is suitable to a maiden's ear: be- 
sides, I cannot sometimes refuse a kiss. 

Eu. They, who would avoid every thing thai 
can give offence, must needs depart out of this life 
altogether. Our ears must be accustomed to hear 
every thing, but transmit to the mind only what is 
good. Your parents, I suppose, allow you a pri- 
vate chamber? 

Ca. Certainly. 

Eu. Thither, then, you may retire, if any enter- 
tainment should happen to become disorderly. — 
There, while the rest are drinking and trifling, do 
you hold holy converse with Christ, your spouse; 
prE^ying, singing, and giving thanks. Your father's 



sea 

house cannot defile you; while you, on the contra- 
ry, may impart to it a character of greater sanctity, 

Ca. Yet, it is safer to he in a convent of nuns. 

Eu. I say nothing against a society of such nuns 
as are truly virgins; but I wish you not to be de- 
ceived hy your imagination, and take appearan- 
ces for realites. Were you to remain for some 
time in the convent you wish to retire to, and ac- 
quire a nearer insight into what is going forward 
there, possibly you might not think every thing 
quite so correct and charming as you did at first. 
Take my word for it, Catharine, all are not virgins 
who wear a veil. 

Ca. Use proper language, Eubulus! 

Eu. Nay, if there be propriety in truth, I do so; 
unless, perhaps, the praise which we have hitherto 
been in the habit of considering as peculiar to the 
Virgin Mother be transferred to other females also. 

Ca. Mention not such an abomination. 

Eu, In no other way, however, can the virgins 
you speak of be altogether sucL as you take them 
to be. 

Ca, No? and why not, 1 pray you? 

feu. Because there are more amongst them who 
will be found to rival Sappho in her morals, than 
to resemble her in her genius. 

Ca. I do not exactly comprehend the meaning 
of your words. 

Eu. My dear Catharine, I do not wish that you 
should; and therefore I talk in the way you hear me. 

Ca. My wishes still point in the same direction. 



S68 

and I cannot but conclude that the spirit by which 
I am actuated on this subject comes from God, 
inasmuch as it has continued for so many years, and 
.still gathers strength from day to day. 

Eu. For my part, I regard this spirit of thine 
with no small degree of suspicion, on account of 
its being opposed with so much earnestness by 
your excellent parents. Were the object you have 
in view really a pious one, God would no doubt 
breathe into their hearts an acquiescence in your 
wishes. The fact is, that the spirit you talk of 
took its rise from the splendid things which affect- 
ed your imagination as a girl, from the soft lan- 
guage of the nuns, from revived affection towards 
your old companions, from the celebration of di- 
vine worship, the specious pomp of ceremonies, 
and the vile exhortations of a set of stupid monks, 
who court you in order that they may have the 
miore to drink. They are well aware that your fa- 
ther is of a kind and liberal disposition, and that 
they shall either have him for their guest, (on con- 
dition that he bring with him wine enough for ten 
potent drinkers,) or that they shall be able to ca- 
rouse, as they please at his table. Wherefore, my 
advite to you is, not to think any farther of ventur- 
ing upon a new course of life in opposition to the 
wishes of your parents. Remember that the au- 
thority of our parents is that under which it is 

God's will that we should remain. 

Ca. But in a case of this kind, it is no want of 

piety to disregard both father and mother. 



364 

Eu. I grant that it is piety to do so on some oc- 
casions, for Christ's sake; though if a Christian 
have a father who is a heathen, and whose whole 
subsiiitence depends upon him, it certainly is no 
mark of piety in the son to desert him, and allow 
him to perish of hunger. Supposing that you had 
not already professed yourself a Christian at your 
baptism, and that your parents were to forbid you 
to be baptized, you would certainly act a pious part 
in preferring Christ to impious parents: or, even 
now, if your parents were to endeavour to force you 
to the commission of any loose or impious act, you 
^vould undoubtedly do right, in such a case, to dis- 
regard their authority. But what has this to do 
with a convent? Christ is with you equally at home. 
It is the dictate of nature that children should obey 
their parents-^a dictate ratified by the approbation 
of God, by the exhortations of St. Paul, and by the 
sanction of human laws: and will you then withdraw 
yourself from the authority of the excellent parents 
you possess, in order to deliver yourself up to those 
who can be father and mother to you only in name, 
or who, to speak more truly, will rule you rather 
as tyrants than as parents? At present, your situa- 
tion with your parents is such, that they still wish 
you to be free; but you, of your own accord, would 
make yourself a slave. The merciful nature of the 
Christian religion has, to a great degree, abolished 
the ancient state of servitude, except in a few coun- 
tries, in which some traces of it still remain. But 
now, under the pretext of religion, a new kind of 



265 

servitude according to the mode of living that at 
present prevails in many convents, has been invent- 
ed. In these places nothing is lawful but what is 
commanded: whatever wealth may fall to you will 
accrue to the community; and should you attempt 
to stir a step beyond your bounds, you will be drag- 
ged back again, as if you had murdered your parents. 
And, that this slavery may be still more conspicuous, 
their proselytes are clothed in a dress different from 
that which was given to them by their parents, 
while, in imitation of the ancient custom of those 
who formerly made a traffic in slaves, a change also 
is made in the baptismal name; so that he who was 
baptized into the service of Christ under the name 
of Peter, is called Thomas on being enlisted in the 
service of St. Dominic. If a soldier in the army cast 
away the uniform given him by his comnvander, he 
is looked upon as having renounced the authority of 
his commander; and yet we applaud those w^ho put 
on a dress not given by Christ, the Lord of all; while 
the punishment inflicted upon them, should they 
change it afterwards, is far greater than would be 
experienced were they to cast off, ever so frequent- 
ly, the dress of their great Leader and Master — I 
mean, innocence of mind. 

Ca. They make a great merit, however, of thus 
voluntarily submitting to this kind of servitude. 

Eu. They who do so, preach a doctrine worthy 
of the Pharisees. St. Paul's doctrine is a very differ- 
ent one; for he teaches that whoever becomes a 
Christian when in a state of freedom, should not 
\ 



266 

willingly be made a slave: while, oh the other hand,' 
the slave who becomes a Christian, should, if an 
opportunity of freedom present itself, avail him- 
self of it. But, farther, the servitude we are speak- 
ing of is the more galling from your having to sub- 
mit to more masters than one, and these, too, for 
the most part fools and profligates; while, in addi- 
tion to this, you are kept in a state of continual un- 
certainty from the changes that occur amongst 
them from time to time. Now, answer me a ques- 
tion, — Do the laws release you from the authority 
of your parents? 

Ca. By no means. 

Eu. Are you at liberty to buy or sell a farm 
against their will? 

Ca. Certainly not. 

Eu. What right, then, can you have to give your- 
self to I know not whom, in express opposition to 
the will of your parents? Are you not their most 
valuable possession — that which is in a peculiar 
sense their own? 

Ca. Where religion is concerned, the laws of 
nature cease. 

Eu. Religion has respect chiefly to baptism; the 
present question relates merely to a change of dress, 
and to a mode of life which in itself is neither good 
tior bad. Consider, also, how many advantages you 
part with when you lose your liberty. You are now 
free to read, pray, or sing, in your own chamber, as 
much and as long as may be agreeable to you; or, 
when you become weary of the privacy of your 



2Q7 

chamber, you have it in your power to hear sacred 
songs, attend divine worship, and listen to discourses 
on heavenly themes. Moreover, should you meet 
with any one remarkable for his piety and wisdom, 
or with any matron or maiden of superior virtues 
and endowments, you can enjoy the advantage of 
their conversation and instructions, for improve- 
ment in all those graces that become the female 
character. You are free, besides, to esteem and 
love the preacher who teaches in sincerity the pure 
doctrines of Christ. But if once you retire into a' 
convent, all these superior opportunities of improve- 
ment in a sound and rational piety are lost to you 
for ever. 

Ca. But, in the mean time, I shall not be a nun. 

Eu. Is it possible that you can still be influenced 
by the sound of a mere name? Consider the sub- 
ject with attention. Much is said about the merit of 
obedience; but will there be any want of this merit 
if you obey those parents whom the ordinance of 
God himself has made it your duty to obey — if you 
obey also your bishop and your pastor? Or will you 
be deficient in the merit of poverty, where every 
thing belongs to your parents? In former times, 
indeed, holy men thought it highly praiseworthy 
in females, dedicated to the service of God, to be 
liberal towards the poor; yet I do not very well per- 
ceive, how they were to exercise this virtue of liber- 
' ality, if they had nothing themselves to give. Fur- 
ther, the jewel of your chastity can suffer no dimi- 
nution in its lustre by your remaining under the 



268 

same roof with your parents. In what, then, con- 
sists the superiority of the state for which you are 
^o eager to leave your own home? truly, in nothing 
but a veil, a linen dress worn outside instead of in- 
side, and a few ceremonies which of themselves 
make nothing for piety, and commend no one in the 
sight of Him with whom favour can be obtained 
only by purity of heart and life. 

Ca. You preach strange doctrine. 

Eu. Not the less true, however, for being strange. 
But, tell me, since you are not released from the 
authority of your parents, and you have not a right 
to sell either a dress or a field, how can you prove 
that you have a right to put yourself under the per- 
petual control of strangers? 

Ca. The authority of parents, they say, cannot 
prevent the claims of religion. 

Eu. Did you not make profession of your faith 
in your baptism? 

Ca. Yes. 

Eu. And are not they religious persons who fol- 
low the precepts of Jesus Christ? 

Ca. Undoubtedly. 

Eu. Then what, I pray you, is this new religion 
which makes void what the law of nature has sanc- 
tioned, — what the ancient law has taught, what the 
gospel has approved, and the doctrine of the apostles 
established and confirmed? I tell you, that such a 
religion is the invention of a parcel of monks, not 
the decree of God. 

Ca. Do vou then think it unlawful for me to be- 



269 

come the spouse of Christ without the consent of 
my parents? 

Eu. You are ah^eady espoused to Christ — we 
have all been espoused to him; and who, I pray you, 
ever thinks of being married twice to the same per- 
son? The subject in debate is merely a question of 
place, dress, and ceremony; and certainly I cannot 
think that the authority of parents is to be slighted 
and set at nought for things like these. 

Ca. But the persons I speak of affirm, that there 
cannot be an act of greater piety than to disregard 
one's parents on such an occasion. 

Eu. Demand, then, of those doctors, to produce 
you a single passage out of the holy scriptures in 
in which any such doctrine is taught. If they can- 
not do this, then require of them to quaff of a cup 
of good Burgundy — you will find them at no loss on 
such a subject. It is the part of true piety to fly 
to Christ for succour from wicked parents; but what 
piety can there be in flying from virtuous parents 
to a convent, — when to do this (as experience often 
shows) is but to fly from the good to the bad? In- 
deed, in former times, when a person was converted 
to the Christian faith, his parents, though idolaters, 
were still considered to have a claim on his obedi- 
ence, as long as that obedience involved no conx- 
promise of his conscience and his faith. 

Ca. Do you then condemn the life of a nun 
altogether? 

Eu. By no means: but as I should not willingly 
advise any who have entered upon such a mode of 

V 2 



270 

life to seek a release from it, so I have no hesitation 
in earnestly exhorting every maiden, especially such 
as are of a noble and generous nature, to take care 
how they heedlessly place themselves in a state from 
which it will be impossible for them afterwards to 
retreat: more particularly as, in the places I allude 
to, a virgin's honour is not unfrequently exposed to 
the greatest danger; and as nothing, moreover, is 
done there, but what can be as well accomplished at- 
home. 

Ca. I cannot but confess that the arguments with 
which you have pressed your point are both nume- 
rous and weighty; yet my desire continues unchang- 
ed and unchangeable. 

Eu. Well, if I cannot succeed in persuading you 
to act as I wish, bear this at least in mind, that 
Eubulus gave you good counsel. In the mean while 
I will pray, from the love I hear you, that this pas- 
sion of yours may be attended with better fortune 
than my advice. 



I. — Page 137. 

TYRANNICAL CONDUCT OF THE CHURCH OF ROME TO- 
WARDS PERSONS OF BOTH SEXES BOUND BY RELIGIOUS 

vows. 

The history of religious oppression under the 
Church of Rome is far from being well known. 
That, under her spiritual government, Christianity 
has at all times contributed towards the happiness 



271 

of mankind, I am ready to acknowledge; because 
no human power can completely quench the heal- 
ing spirit of the Gospel. But it would be difficult, 
indeed, to ascertain whether the at once gloomy and 
pompous superstition which, under the guidance 
of the popes, has been so intimately blended with 
Christianity, has not produced more bitterness of 
suffering in the human breast, than even the hope 
of immortality can allay. Woe to the ardent and 
sincere, amongst the spiritual subjects of Rome! 
for she will sacrifice them, body and soul, to a mere 
display of her spiritual dominion. 

Nothing, however, is more difficult than to col- 
lect the evidence of individual suffering, produced 
by Roman Catholic tyranny. Enough transpires 
in the monasteries of both sexes, to form an esti- 
mate of the wretchedness that dwells in them. But 
hopelessness and shame smother the sighs of their 
female inhabitants. Yet knowledge of human na- 
ture, a moderate degree of candour, and the con- 
sideration of the laws which have enforced, and 
still ensure, an internal compliance with the en- 
gagements of the religious profession; are sufficient 
to give an awful, though momentary view, of the 
mass of misery which perpetual vows have pro- 
duced. 

There was a time when the will of a parent could 
bind a child for ever to the monastic life. That 
liberal Council of Toledo, whose laws about the 
Jews have been inserted in a preceding note, de? 
dares that "a monk is made either by paternal de- 



27^ 



votion, or personal profession. Whatever is bound 
in this manner, will hold fast. We therefore, shut 
up, in regard to these, all access to the world, and 
forbid all return to a secular life.'' Monachum aut 
paterna devotio, aut propria professio facit. Quic- 
quid horum fuerit alligatum tenebit. Proinde his 
ad mundum revertendi intercludimus aditura, et 
omnem ad saeculum interdicimus regressum. (Con- 
cil. Tolet. IV. Can. 48.) 

By the more modern discipline of the Church of 
Rome, this practice has been abolished; but, as it 
happens in all palliations of essential evils, the 
abolition of the barbarous power granted to parents, 
by removing that which shocked at first sight, only 
makes the remaining grievance more hopeless, — 
There is, indeed, little difference in allowing boys 
and girls of sixteen to bind themselves with perpetu- 
al vows, and devoting them irrevocably to the clois- 
ter from the cradle. The Church of Rome, in her 
present regulations, only adds the artfulness of se- 
duction to the unfeelingness of cruelty. I will here 
give her laws upon this subject, in the original lan- 
guage of the Council of Trent; and subjoin the 
brief statement of two cases, as instances of their 
practical operation. 

Can. 9. De Matri7nonio, — "Si quis dixerit, cleri- 
cos in sacris ordinibus constitutos, vel regulares cas- 
titatem solemniter professos,* posse matrimonium 

* The reader will here observe the difference between 
the secular and the regular clergy. The former do not 
bind themselves with vows: their celibacy is enforced only by 
the law which renders their marriag'es null and void. 



27S 

contrahere contractumque validum esse, non ob- 
stante lege ecclesiastica, vel voto; posseque omnes 
contrahere matrimonium, qui non sentiunt se casti- 
tatis, etiamsi earn voverint, habere dfemum, anathe- 
ma sit, cum Deus id recte petentibus non deneget, 
nee patiatur nos supra id quos possumus, tentari.'* 

Sessio XXV. cap. 5. — "Bonifacii octavi constitu- 
tionem, quae incipit: Fericuloso^ renovans sancta 
synodus, universis episcopis, sub obtestatione divi- 
ni judicii, et interminatione maledictionis aeternse, 
praecipit, ut in omnibus monasteriis sibi subjectis, 
ordinaria, in aliis vero, sedis apostolica auctoritate, 
clausuram sanctimonialiura, ubi violata fuerit, dili- 
genler restitui, et ubi inviolata est, conservari 
maxime procurent: inobedientes atque contradic- 
tores per censuras ecclesiasticas, aliasque poenas, 
quacumque appellatione postposita, compescentes, 
invocato ad hoc, si opus fuerit, auxilio brachii 
saecularis. Quod auxilium ut praebeatur, omnes 
Christianos principes hortatur sancta synodus, et 
sub poena excommunicationis, ipso facto incurren- 
da, omnibus magistratibus saecularibus injungit. — 
Nemini autem sanctimonialium liceat post profes- 
sionem exire a monasterio etiam ad breve tempus, 
quocumque praetentur." 

lb. cap. 19. — "Quicumque regularis praetendat 
se per yim et metum ingressum esse religionem, 
aut etiam dicat ante aetatem debitam professum 
fuisse, aut quid simile, velitqiie habitum dimittere, 
quacumque de causa, aut etiam cum habitu disce- 
dere sine licentia superiorum, non audiatnr, nisi 



S74 

intra quinquennium tantum, a die professionis, et 
tunc, non aliter nisi causas quas pr3etenderit de- 
duxerit coram superiore suo et ordinario. Quod 
si antea habitum sponte dimiserit, nullatenus ad 
allegandum quamcumque causam admittatur; sed 
ad monasterium redire cogatur, et tamquam apos- 
tata puniatur; interim nuHo privilegio su9e religio- 
nis juvetur," 

How strictly these laws are preserved in vigour 
by the proud tyranny of the Church of Rome, and 
the blind subserviency of every government and 
people who acknowledge her, I will instance in two 
cases. The first I have on the authority of Don 
Andres Bello, Secretary to the Colombian Lega- 
tion in this country: a gentleman whose great 
worth, talents and learning, I have had many an 
opportunity to know and admire, during an ac- 
quaintance of nearly fifteen years. The second is 
one of the many cases which I can attest from my 
personal knowledge. 

The desertion of monks, according to the infor- 
mation which my friend Mr. Bello has given me on 
this point, has been at all times frequent in the 
territories of Spanish America. Their general 
conduct, I have been assured by everyone acquaint- 
ed with that country, is openly and outrageously 
profligate. One of the unfortunate slaves of Rome, 
*'a man who (to use my friend's own expression) 
having been his own instructor, lived miserable be- 
cause his mind was far above all that surrounded 
him," took the determination of absconding from 



275 

his cowled masters, and sought for liberty in exile. 
His real name was Father Christoval de Quesada, 
a native of Cumana, and Friar of the Order of Mer- 
cy. Under the assumed designation of Don Carlos 
de Sucre, he travelled in different countries of Eu- 
rope, and was everywhere admired for his accom- 
plishments and agreeable manners. The love of 
his country betrayed him, at length, into the rash 
step of venturing back, — yet at a sufficient distance 
from his native town to imagine himself safe from 
detection. His abilities recommended him to the 
archbishop of Caracas, who made him his secreta- 
ry. Some years had elapsed, when a person, hav- 
ing desired to speak privately to the supposed Su- 
cre, showed him that he was in possession of his 
secret; but engaged to keep it — probably in con- 
sideration of some pecuniary reward. The unfor- 
tunate runaway knew too well the nature of his cir- 
cumstances, and danger; and only thought of sur- 
rendering on the most favourable conditions. He 
disclosed his case to the archbishop, who engaged 
the head of the Order of Mercy to receive the un- 
fortunate Father Christoval, without inflicting any 
punishment for his flight. "It was in these circum- 
stances (says my friend, in an interesting letter to 
me) that he taught me Latin, a language which he 
possessed in perfection. He was a man of uncom- 
mon good nature; plain and unaffected in his man- 
ners, and rather slovenly in his dress. To classi- 
cal knowledge he added that of mathematics, and a 
considerable taste for Spanish poetry. His ser- 



S76 

Hions were excellent whenever he took the pains to 
write them, which was seldom the case. He volun- 
tarily took charge of the library of the convent; 
which he enriched with many excellent works, un- 
known till then in my town. He also devoted part 
of his time to the garden of the convent, which had 
hitherto been allowed to overrun with weeds. Part 
of the ground he allotted to a numerous breed of 
ducks, fowls, and other domestic animals; but from 
this he was obliged to desist, for the friars whose 
siesta was disturbed by the cackling, contrived to 
poison their brother's favourites." — "Such (he con- 
cludes) is the history of Father Quesada, who gave 
to his return to the convent the appearance of a 
voluntary act, and donned his frock with the best 
good humour in the world; well aware that in his 
circumstances any thing else would have been most 
imprudent. I have heard in South America a 
thousand other cases of runaway friars, who have 
been forced back to their convents; but I am not 
in possession of the individual circumstances." 

A strong mind, and a natural good temper, di- 
vested the preceding instance of the horrors which 
generally attend the capture of the spiritual slaves 
who seek liberty by flight. That which I am about 
to relate is of a much more melancholy cast. I 
have laid it already before the public, in Doblado's 
Letters from Spain; but though that work contains 
no other fiction but a few changes of names, I 
deem it necessary to record, with all the solemnity 
ejf history, the fate of the unfortunate nun whom I 
there introduced to mv readers. 



The eldest daughter of a family, intimately ac- 
quainted with mine, was brought up in the convent 
of Saint Agness at Seville, under the care of her mo- 
ther's sister, the abbess of that female community. 
The circumstances of the whole transaction were 
so public at Seville, and the subsequent judicial 
proceedings have given them such notoriety, that 
I do not feel bound to conceal names. Maria Fran* 
cisca Barreiro^ the unfortunate subject of this ac- 
count, grew up, a lively and interesting girl, in the 
convent; while a younger sister enjoyed the advan- 
tages of an education at home. The mother form- 
ed an early design of devoting her eldest daughter 
to religion, in order to give to her less attractive 
favourite a better chance of getting a husband. — 
The distant and harsh manner with which she 
constantly treated Maria Francisca, attached the 
unhappy girl to her aunt by the ties of the most ar- 
dent affection. The time, however, arrived when 
it was necessary that she should either leave her, 
and endure the consequences of her mother's aver- 
sion at home, or take the vows, and thus close the 
gates of the convent upon herself for ever. She 
preferred the latter course; and came out to pay 
the last visit to her friends. I met her, almost 
daily, at the house of one of her relations; where 
her words and manner soon convinced me that she 
was a victim of her mother's designing and unfeel- 
ing disposition. The father was an excellent man, 
though timid and undecided. He feared his wife, 
and was in awe of the monks; who, as usual, were 
W 



378 

extremely anxious to increase the number of their 
female prisoners. Though I was aware of the dan- 
ger which a man incurs in Spain, who tries to dis- 
suade a young woman from being a nun, humanity 
impelled me to speak seriously to the father, entreat- 
ing him not to expose a beloved child to spend her 
life in hopeless regret for lost liberty. He was 
greatly moved by my reasons; but the impression I 
miade was soon obliterated. The day for Maria 
Francisca's taking the veil was at length fixed; and 
though I had a most pressing invitation to be pre- 
sent at the ceremony, I determined not to see the 
wretched victim at the altar. On the preceding 
day, I was called from my stall at the Royal Chapel, 
to the confessional. A lady, quite covered by her 
black veil, was kneeling at the grate through which 
females speak to the confessor. As soon as I took 
my seat, the well-known voice of Maria Francisca 
made me start with surprise. Bathed in tears, and 
scarcely able to speak without betraying her state 
to the people who knelt near the confessional box, 
by the sobs which interrupted her words; she told 
me she wished only to unburden her heart to me, 
before she shut up herself for life. Assistance, she 
assured me, she would not receive; for rather than 
live with her mother, and endure the obloquy to 
which her swerving from her announced determi- 
nation would expose her, she "would risk the sal- 
vation of her soul.'* All my remonstrances were 
in vain. I offered to obtain the protection of the 
s^rchbishop, and thereby to extricate her from the 



279 

difficulties in which she was involved. She declin- 
ed my offer, and appeared as resolute as she was 
wretched. The next morning she took the veil; 
and professed at the end of the following year. — 
Her good aunt died soon after; and the nuns, who 
had allured her into the convent by their caresses, 
when they perceived that she was not able to dis- 
guise her misery, and feared that the existence of 
a reluctant nun might by her means transpire, be- 
came her daily tormentors. 

After an absence of three years from Seville, I 
found that Maria Francisca had openly declared 
her aversion to a state, from which nothing but 
death could save her. She often changed her con- 
fessors, expecting comfort from their advice. At 
last she found a friend in one of the companions of 
my youth; a man whose benevolence surpasses even 
the bright genius with which nature has gifted 
him: though neither has been able to exempt him 
from the evils to which Spaniards seem to be fated 
in proportion to their worth. He became her con- 
fessor, and in that capacity spoke to her daily,'— 
But what could he do against the inflexible tyran- 
ny in whose grasp she languished! 

About this time the approach of Napoleon's ar- 
my threw the town into a general consternation, 
and the convents were opened to such of the nuns 
as wished to fly. Maria Francisca, whose parents 
were absent, put herself under the protection of a 
young prebendary of the Cathedral, and by his 
means reached Cadiz, where I saw her, on my way 



S80 

to England. I shall never forget the anguish with 
which, after a long conversation, wherein she dis- 
closed to me the whole extent of her wretchedness, 
she exclaimed. There is no ho/iefor me! and fell in- 
to convulsions. 

The liberty of Spain from the French invaders 
was the signal for the fresh confinement of this 
helpless young woman to her former prison. Here 
she attempted to put an end to her sufferings by 
throwing herself into a deep well; but was taken 
out alive. Her mother was now dead, and her 
friends instituted a suit of nullity of profession^ be^ 
fore the ecclesiastical court. But the laws of the 
Council of Trent were positive; and she was cast in 
the trial. Her despair, however, exhausted the lit- 
tle strength which her protracted sufferings had 
left her, and the unhappy Maria Francisca died 
soon after, having scarcely reached her twenty-fifth 
year. 



OORRUPTION OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY AT THE 
PERIOD O? THE COUNCIL OF TRENT. 

The corrupt morals which prevailed among the 
Roman Catholic bishops and higher clergy, are at- 
tested by the legates who presided at the first ses- 
sions of the Council of Trent. 

"Hoc enim summatim dicimus de omni genere 
armorum si, qui ilia contra nos tractarunt, a suis 
ecclesiis pastores fugarunt, ordines confuderunt, 



381 

liaicos in episcoporum locum suffecerunt, ecclesiae 
bona diripuerunt, cursum verbi Dei impediverunt: 
hie, inquam, dicimus, nihil horum esse, quod in 
libro abusuum pastorum, maxima illorum fiars^ qui 
hoc nomen sibi vendicant, per se factum esse, si 
legere libuerint, non scriptum aperlis verbis inve- 
iiiant. JVostram enim ambitionem^ nostrum avari- 
iiamj nostras cufiiditates^ his omnibus malis populum 
Dei prius affecisse statim inveniet alque harum 
vi ab ecclesiis pastores fugari, easque pabulo verbi 
privari, bona ecclesiarum, quae sunt bona paupe- 
rum ab illis tolli, indignis sacerdotia conferri, et 
illis qui nihil a laicis praeterquam in vestis genere, 
ac ne in hoc quidem differunt, dari. Quid enim, 
horum est, quod negare fiossimus fier hos annos a no- 
bis factum esse,'' — Concione ad Concilium, pp. 736, 
737. Collect Labbei et Gossartii. 



K — Page 160. 

REAL INFLUENCE OF ROME AND THE MONKS UPON 
LEARNING. 

Opinion is no less subject than taste to the peri* 
odical turns and changes of fashion. The love of 
the romantic has lately raised every thing belong- 
ing to the middle ages in the estimation of the 
reading public, and monks and monasteries share 
the favour into which the period of their full pros- 
perity has grown. We constantly hear of the ser- 
vices which the monks and their church have refi- 
W 2 



282 

dered to religion and learning; and men seem wil- 
ling either to disbelieve or forget the deep wounds 
which their gross ignorance, and still grosser im- 
morality, gave to both. 

These alternate turns of the public attention to 
the favourable and unfavourable side of historical 
subjects deprive us of the benefits of experience, as 
we might derive them from the records of former 
times. To judge of the utility of old institutions, 
we should be careful not to mistake the accidental 
effects which they may have produced, for the pre- 
dominant and decided tendency of their moral opera- 
tion. There is no human establishment unmixed 
with evil: of this we are well aware; but few men 
are fully impressed with the fact, that no pure and 
unmixed evil can long exist, except by open vio- 
lence. When, therefore, we see any law, custom, or 
establishment supported and cherished for a length 
of time, we may be sure that its existence is con- 
nected with some real, though partial, advantages. 
The philosopher, in such cases, should not confine 
his observation to the partial operation on either 
side, good or evil; but examine in the first place, 
whether the original rise of the institution took 
place at the expense of social prosperity; and next, 
whether, upon the whole, it was calculated eventual- 
ly to improve or degrade society. 

The epigram made upon the usurer who, having 
impoverished a district, founded an extensive alms- 
house to keefi the floor he had tnade^ is, I believe, per- 
fectly applicable to the monks and their peculiar 



283 

church, in regard to the mental interests of man- 
kind. They first barbarized the polished subjects 
of imperial Rome, and then fed them with the in- 
tellectual garbage of their schools. 

A number of circumstances made the Christians 
of the primitive ages extremely averse to profane 
literature. The first cause of this was their general 
want of education; for it pleased God to change the 
moral face of the world by the instrumentality of the 
poor and ignorant, that the supernatural work of 
his grace in the conversion of mankind might be 
evident. "Not many wise men after the flesh, not 
many mighty, not many noble are called; but God 
hath chosen the foolish things of the world to eon- 
found the wise, that no flesh should glory in his 
presence."* The abuse of the name of science was, 
in the second place, a source of strong dislike to 
knowledge among the early Christians, Abomi- 
nable practices of sortilege and imposture were 
common among those men, who under the name of 
mathematicians, Chaldeans, and astrologers, were 
known all over the empire in the first century of the 
Christian sera. The prevalence of these abuses 
may be conceived by the multitude of books on 
magic which were burnt at Ephesus, in consequence 
of the preaching of Paul.t 

* 1 Cor. i. 27, 29. 

f "Many of them also which used curious arts brought theii* 
books together, and burned them before all men; and they 
counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces 
of silver.'* Acts xix. 19, 



284 

But nothing appears to have so much prepared 
the darkness of the middle ages, as the prevalence 
of monkery in the Christian church. The extraor- 
dinary reverence paid to the grossly ignorant mul- 
titudes who inhabited the Egyptian deserts* must 
naturally have tended to the discredit of study and 
acquirements. When the monastic institution was 
introduced into the West, and became widely spread 
under the patronage of the Popes, a spirit of oppo- 
sition to every thing that can refine and enlighten 
the mind became visible. As both literature and 
the arts had flourished among the heathen, zeal and 
piety conspired to render them odious to the gene- 
rality of Christians. If, as there is reason to sus- 
pect it, the Christians joined the barbarians in the 
destruction of the works of art, the charge falls es- 
pecially upon the monks, who appear to have court- 
ed and gained the favour of the invaders.f 

* There were 76,000 monks in Egypt at the end of the 4tlji 
century. 

f Dr. Clarke, in his work on Greek Marbles^ seems to un- 
derstand two passages from Eunapius in this sense. I con- 
fess that, considering the circumstances of the case, the fact 
is extremely probable to me; but the words of Eunapius may 
be understood, not of direct, but indirect co-operation with 
the irruption of the barbarians into Greece. Eunapius says, 
**that the impiety of those who wore black garments (the 
monks) had opened the passage of the Thermopylae to Alaric 
and his barbarians.** This may be understood in the same 
sense as it is said that the weakness of the Koman govern- 
ment invited the invasion of the northean tribes. The Latin 
translation is too definite for the original, and does not render 



285 

But nothing is more certain than that the neglect 
of ancient literature, and the substitution of scholas- 
tic learning, was chiefly the work of hina who, as 
it were in mockery of titles bestowed by men, is 
called the Great among the Popes who bore the 
name of Gregory. That his zeal in the propaga- 
tion of Christianity was extraordinary and sincere, 
it would be injustice to doubt; but it is equally in- 
dubitable, that, to a mind grossly superstitious and 
ignorant, he joined a shocking indifference to moral 
character in those who felt disposed to favour the 
Roman see, and her then maturing plans of supre- 
macy. His flattery of the monster Phocas is a dis- 
grace "both to Gregory and to his see, and shows 
the character of papal ambition in its true colours.* 

Gregory enjoyed a most extraordinary moral in- 
fluence in his time, which he wholly directed to the 
object of effacing the few remaining traces of an- 
cient literature, and introducing monkish learning 
in its worst shape. "A report has reached our 
ears," he writes to a professor of grammar, "which 
I cannot mention without shame, that your fraterni- 
ty expounds grammar to some persons: this is so 
painful to us, and it so vehemently raises our scorn, 
that it has changed all I have previously said into 
wailing and sorrow — the same mouth, indeed, can- 
not hold the praises of Jupiter and of Christ." 

it strictly. Instead of the abstract word acff j3f ta, it has i7npia 
gens. See Eunapius De Vit. Philos. in JHaximo, 

* See the article under Greg'ory's name in Bayle's Diction- 
arv.. See also Gibbon, 



286 

Gregory made a public boast of his ignorance, and 
inveighed with such vehemence against all polite 
literature, that the report of his having burnt the 
Palatine library, collected at Rome by the emperors, 
though doubted by modern critics, receives a strong 
confirmation from his character. *'I scorn," he 
says, "that art of speaking which is conveyed by 
external teaching. The very tenor of this epistle 
shows that I do not avoid the clashing of metacism, 
nor the obscurity of barbarism: I despise all trouble 
about prepositions and cases, because I hold it most 
unworthy to put the heavenly oracles under the 
restraint of a grammarian."* 

With such a pattern of elegance and learning be- 
fore them, the Christian world had no fair chance 
at the beginning of the seventh century to escape 
the intellectual darkness which was settling on 
Europe. Gregory's books on morals were general- 
ly substituted in the room of Plato, Aristotle, and 
Cicero. Pope Theodore 1st. gave out that he had 
recovered the lost copy of that work by a revela- 
tion of St. Peter and St. Paul, and thus enhanced 
its value to those who, from distant countries, sent 
for ii to Rome, to make it the source and standard 
of their knov/ledgc.f Abstracts and digests of it 

* Non metacismi coUisionem effugio, non barbarismi con- 
fusionem devito: situs, motu^que praepositionum casusque ser- 
vare contemno, quia indig'ns'm vehementer existimo, ut verba 
ccElestis oraculi restring-am sub r^g-ulis Doiiatl. 

t Mariana claims the honour of the revelation for T&jon, 
bishop of Saragossa. Hist, de Espana, L. vi. c. viii. 



^87 

were industriously compiled for the use of students, 
and Gregory became the founder, master, and lead- 
er of the barbarous schools of the middle ages. 

The limits of a note oblige me to refer my read- 
ers to the interesting history of the rise of school 
philosophy, given by Brucker, Period. II. Pars II. 
cap. ii. de Philos. Christ. Occident, torn. iii. 

On the moral character of the monks, Fleury, a 
Roman Catholic, gives considerable information in 
his eighth discourse, prefixed to Vol. XX. of his 
Histoire Ecclesiastique. 



L. — Page 175. 



PKOOLAMATION OF THE JUBILEE FOR THE PRESENT 
YEAR OF 1825. 

The Bull by which the present Pope has proclaim- 
ed the jubilee is so curious a document, that pos- 
terity will hardly believe it was really published in 
the last year of the first quarter of the nineteenth 
century. I wish to increase its circulation as much 
as it may be in my power; for I am persuaded no 
arguments are so powerful against Rome as the au- 
thentic documents in which she breathes out her 
genuine spirit. I beg the attention of the reader 
to the catalogue of curious relics, by which the 
Pope tries to draw pilgrims to his capital; and to 
that part of the Bull where he addresses all Protes- 



288 

lants, inviting them "to have one consentient mind 
with this (the Roman) Church, the mother and 
mistress of all others^ out of to hie h there is no salva^ 
tionj' 

The translation which I use is taken from the Ro- 
man Catholic Laity's Directory for 1825. 

LEO BISHOP, 

SERVANT OF THE SERVANTS OF GOD, 

To all the faithful of Christ who shall see these fir esents^ 
health and ajiostolical benediction. 

In the merciful dispensations of the Lord, it is at 
length granted to our humility, to announce to you 
with joy, that the period is at hand, when what we 
regretted was omitted at the commencement of 
the present century, in consequence of the direful 
calamities of the times, is to be happily observed ac- 
cording to the established custom of our forefathers; 
for that most propitious year, entitled to the utmost 
religious veneration, is approaching, when christians 
from every region of the earth will resort to this our 
holy city and the chair of blessed Peter, and when 
the most abundant treasures of reconciliation and 
grace will be offered as means of salvation to all the 
faithful disposed to perform the exercises of piety 
which are prescribed. During this year, which we 
truly call the acceptable time and the time of sal- 
vation, we congratulate you that a favourable oc- 
casion is presented, when, after the miserable accu- 



289 

mulation of disasters under which we have groan- 
ed, we may strive to renew all things in Christ, by 
the salutary atonement of all christian people. We 
have therefore resolved, in virtue of the authority 
given to us by Heaven, fully to unlock that sacred 
treasure, composed of the merits, sufferings, and 
virtues of Christ our Lord, and of his Virgin Mo- 
ther, and of all the saints, which the Author of hu- 
man salvation has intrusted to our dispensation. 

In this it becomes us to magnify the abundant 
riches of the divine clemency, by which Christ, pre- 
venting us with the blessings of sweetness, so willed 
the infinite power of his merits to be diffused 
through the parts of his mystical body, that they 
by reciprocal co-operation, and by the most whole- 
some communication of advantages flowing from 
faith, which worketh by charity, might mutually 
assist each other: and by the immense price of the 
blood of the Lord, and for his sake and virtue, as 
also by the merits and suffrages of the saints, might 
gain the remission of the temporal punishment, 
which the fathers of the Council of Trent have 
taught is not always entirely remitted, as is the case 
in baptism, by the sacrament of penance. 

Let the earth, therefore, hear the words of our 
mouth, and let the whole world joyfully hearken to 
the voice of the priestly trumpet sounding forth to 
God's people the sacred Jubilee. We proclaim that 
the year of atonement and pardon, of redemption 
and grace, of remission and indulgence, is arrived; 
in which we know that those benefits which the old 
X 



290 

law, the messenger of things to come, brought every 
fiftieth year to the Jewish people, are renewed in a 
much more sacred manner by the accumulation of 
spiritual blessing through Him by whom came peace 
and truth. For if the lands that had been sold, and 
property that had passed into other hands, were re- 
claimed in that salutary year, so we recover wow, by 
the infinite liberality of God, the virtues, and merits, 
and gifts, of which we are despoiled by sin. If then 
the chains of human bondage ceased to exist, — so 
at present, by shaking off the most galling yoke of 
diabolical subjection, we are called to the liberty of 
God's children, to that liberty which Christ has 
granted us. If, in fine, by the precept of the law, 
pecuniary debts were then pardoned to debtors, and 
they became discharged from every bond, — we are 
also exonerated from a much heavier debt of sins, 
and are released by the divine mercy from the 
punishments incurred by them. 

Eagerly wishing that so many and such great ad- 
vantages may accrue to your souls, and confidently 
invoking God, the giver of all good gifts, through 
the bowels of his mercy, in conformity to the exi- 
gency of the prescribed period, and the pious insti- 
tutes of the Roman pontiffs, our predecessors, and 
walking in their footsteps, — we, with the assent of 
our venerable brethren, the cardinals of the holjr 
Roman church, do, by the authority of Almighty 
God, and of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul, and 
by our own, for the glory of God himself, the exal- 
tation of the Catholic churchi and the sanctification 



S91 

of all Christian people, ordain and publish the uni- 
versal and most solemn Jubilee to commence in this 
holy city from the first vespers of the Nativity of 
our most holy Saviour Jesus Christ, next ensuing, 
and to continue during the whole year 1825; during 
which year of the Jubilee we mercifully give and 
grant in the Lord a plenary indulgence, remission, 
and pardon of all their sins, to all the faithful of 
Christ of both sexes, truly penitent and confessing 
their sins, and receiving the holy communion, who 
shall devoutly visit the churches of blessed Peter 
and Paul, as also of St. John Lateran and St. Mary 
Major, of this city, for thirty successive or uninter- 
rupted (whether natural or ecclesiastical) days, to 
be counted, to wit, from the first vespers of one day 
until the evening twilight of the day following, pro- 
vided they be Romans or inhabitants of this city; 
but if they be pilgrims or otherwise strangers, if 
they shall do the same for fifteen days, and shall 
pour fourth their pious prayers to God for the ex- 
altation of the holy church, the extirpation of here- 
sies, concord of Catholic princes, and the safety and 
tranquillity of christian people. 

And because it may happen that some persons 
who shall set out on their journey, or shall arrive 
in this city, may be detained in their way, or even 
in the city itself, by illness or other lawful excuse, 
or be prevented by death from completing the pre- 
scribed number of days, or perhaps even beginning 
them, and may be unable to comply with the premi- 
ses, and visit the said churches, we will, in our de- 



293 

sire of graciously favouring their pious and ready 
disposition as far as we can in the Lord, that the 
same, being truly penitent and confessing their sins, 
and receiving the holy communion, become par- 
takers of the aforesaid indulgence and remission as 
fully as if they had actually visited the said church- 
es on the days by us appointed; so that, though, 
hindered by the necessities aforesaid, they may, by 
the gift of the Holy Spirit, obtain the effect of their 
desires. 

These things we announce to you, beloved child- 
ren, with a fatherly affection, that you, who labour 
and are burthened, may hasten thither, where you 
know for certain that refreshment awaits you. 
Neither is it allowable to remain indifferent and 
heartless about acquiring these salutary riches from 
the eternal treasures of divine grace which the most 
holy and indulgent mother, the church, throws open 
to you, whilst men are so eagerly intent on amass* 
ing earthly possessions, which the moth consumes 
or the rust eats away. And w hen, from the earliest 
times, there has been great and constant concourse 
of people, of every station, flocking from all parts 
of the globe, in defiance of the length and the 
dangers of the journey, to visit this principal resi- 
dence of the fine arts, which they admire like a 
brilliant prodigy, for the magnificence of its build- 
ings, and the majesty of the place, and the beauty 
of its monuments, — it would indeed be base, and 
most foreign to the desire of never-ending happiness, 
to pretend the difficulty or dangers of the journey, 



393 

and similar excuses, to decline the pilgrimage to 
Rome. There is, beloved brethren, there is in re- 
serve what will most amply remunerate you for 
every inconvenience and hardship: yes, these suffer- 
ings, if any such occur, are not fit to be compared 
to the weight of glory to come, which, with God's 
assistance, will be secured to you by the means pre- 
pared for the sanctification of your souls. For you 
will here reap the most abundant fruits of penance, 
'^y which you may offer to God the sacrifice of your 
bodies, chastised by continued acts of self-denial; 
may religiously perform the works of piety pre- 
scribed by the conditions of the indulgence; and 
may add a new force to your fixed and persevering 
resolution to satisfy for your past crimes by peni* 
tential austerities, and to avoid all sin for the time 
to come. 

Therefore ascend with loins girt up to this holy 
Jerusalem, this priestly and royal city, which, by 
the sacred chair of the blessed Peter, become the 
capital of the world, is seen to maintain more ex- 
tensive dominion by the divine influence of religion 
than by earthly authority. "For this is the city,'* 
said St. Charles, exhorting his people to visit Rome 
in the holy year, "this is the city whose soil, walls, 
altars, churches, tombs of the martyrs, and every, 
visible object, suggest something religious to the 
mind, as ihey experience and feel, who approach 
these sacred abodes with proper dispositions.** 
Consider how much it conduces to excite faith and 
charity, to proceed round those ancient places, by 
X 2 



294 : 

which the majesty of religion is wonderfqlly recom- 
mended; then to place before one's eyes so many 
thousand martyrs, who have consecrated this very 
soil with their blood — to enter their churches, to 
"witness their honours, and venerate their shrines. 
Now, "if heaven is not so resplendent, when the 
sun darts forth its rays, as is the city of the Romans, 
possessing those two luminaries, Peter and Paul, 
diffusing their light through the universe," as St. 
John Chrysostome said, who will dare, without tlv. 
affection of the tenderest devotion, to approach their 
CONFESSIONS, to prostratc before their tombs, and 
kiss their chains, more precious than gold and gems. 
Who, in fine, can refrain from tears, when, per- 
ceiving the cradle of Christ, he shall recollect the 
infant Jesus crying in the manger; or, saluting the 
most sacred instruments of our Lord's passion, shall 
meditate on the Redeemer of the world hanging on 
the cross? 

Since these venerable monuments of religion, by 
the singularbounty of divine Providence, are collect- 
ed in this city alone, they are truly the sweetest 
pledges of love,— that the Lord laveth the gates of 
Sion above all the tents of Jacob; and they affection- 
ately invite you all, dearest children, without delay, 
to ascend the mountain, where it has pleased the 
Lord to dwell. 

But here our solicitude demands that we especial- 
ly address all ranks in this holy city; reminding 
them that the eyes of the faithful, arriving from 
every part of the world, are fixed upon themj that^ 



S95 

therefore, nothing but what is grave, moderate, and 
becoming the Christian, ought to appear in them; 
so that all may seek from their conduct an example 
of modesty, innocence, and of every kind of virtue. 
Hence, from this chosen people, among whom the 
Prince of pastors has pleased that the chair of the 
most blessed Peter should be fixed, let the rest of 
mankind learn how to reverence the Catholic church 
and ecclesiastical authority, to obey its precepts, and 
always to render great honour to ecclesiastical 
things and persons. 

Let the respect that is due to churches be con- 
spicuous in them, so that nothing may be observed 
by strangers of a nature to bring the sacred rights 
of religion or holy places into contempt or disrepute; 
nothing that can offend decency, purity, or modesty; 
nothing but what will excite admiration and edifica- 
tion. Let all be correct and regular in their con- 
duct; let them show by their external behaviour that 
they attend the duties of religion, not merely by 
their corporeal presence, but in the true spirit of 
piety and devotion. 

We also press on their attention, not to appear en- 
gaged, on the days appointed for sacred offices and 
the honour of God and his saints, in the celebra- 
tion of feasting, and amusements, and unseasonable 
mirth, and wanton licentiousness. In fine, "whatever 
things are true, whatever are modest, whatever are 
just, whatever are holy, whatever are lovely, what- 
ever are of good fame,"— let these shine forth in 
the Roman people, so that we may congratulate 



2iiG 

ihem that the glory of faith and piety, for which 
they were recommended as an example by the apos- 
tle Paul, and which have been transmitted to them 
by their ancestors as their best inheritance, has 
received no tarnish, but has even been illustrated 
in their zeal and edifying conduct. 

We are indeed refreshed with this consoling 
hope, that each one will be zealous for the better 
gifts, that the sheep of the I^ord's flock will run to 
the embraces of the Shepherd, and that all will be 
as an army in battle array, having charity for their 
banner. Therefore, "Jerusalem, lift up thine eyes 
round about, and see: thy sons from far shall come 
to thee, and thy heart shall wonder and be enlarg- 
ed." But would to God "that the children of them 
that aiRicted thee would come bowing down to 
thee, and all that slander thee would worship the 
steps of thy feet." To you, to you we address 
ourselves with the entire affection of our apos- 
tolic heart, whom we bewail as separated from the 
true church of Christ and the road of salvation. — 
In this common exultation, this alone is wanted: 
grant it to your most loving parent, that at length, 
called by the inspiration of the Spirit from above 
into his admirable light, and bursting asunder eve- 
ry snare of division, you may have one consentient 
mind with this church, the mother and mistress of 
all others, out of which there is no salvation. En- 
larging our heart, we will joyfully receive you into 
our fatherly bosom, and will bless the God of all 
consolation, who, in this greatest triumph of Ca- 
tholic faith, shall enrich us with these riches of his 
mercy. 



But you, venerable brethren, patriarchs, pri- 
mates, archbishops, bishops, co-operate with these 
our cares and desires; call a solemn assembly, ga- 
ther the people, that your children may be prompt- 
ed to receive those gifts which the Father of mer- 
cies has entrusted for distribution amongst the 
children of his love, through the ministry of our 
humility; remind them, that short are the days of 
this our pilgrimage; and since we know not at what 
hour the Father of the household may come, that 
we must therefore be on the watch, and bear in 
our hands burning lamps full of the oil of charity, 
so that we may readily and cheerfully meet the 
Lord's arrival. To you it belongs to explain with 
perspicuity the power of indulgences; what is their 
efficacy, not only in the remission of the canonical 
penance, but also of the temporal punishment due 
to the divine justice for past sin; and what succour 
is afforded out of this heavenly treasure, from the 
merits of Christ and his skints, to such as have de- 
parted real penitents in God's love, yet before they 
had duly satisfied by fruits w^orthy of penance for 
sin of commission and omission, and are now puri- 
fying in the fire of purgatory, that an entrance may 
be opened for them into their eternal country, 
where nothing defiled is admitted. Courage and 
attention, venerable brethren! for some there are, 
following that wisdom which is not from God, and 
covering themselves with the clothing of sheep, — 
under the usual pretence of a more refined piety, 
are now sowing amongst the people erroneous com- 
ments on this subject. Do you teach ihe flock 



iS98 

fheir several duties; in what deeds of piety and 
charity they ought to employ themselves; with 
what diligence, with what sense of sorrow, they 
ought to examine themselves and their past life; 
that they should remove and correct what is per- 
nicious in their conduct, so that they may obtain 
the most abundant and proper fruit of this most 
sacred indulgence. 

But it becomes you, venerable brethren, princi- 
pally to attend to this, that the members of your 
respective flocks, who undertake the pilgrimage, 
may perform it with a religious spirit; that they 
should avoid every thing on the journey which can 
disturb their pious purpose, or withdraw them from 
their holy resolutions; and that they should dili- 
gently follow up whatever is conducive to animate 
and inflame devotion. If, taking into consideration 
your persons and places, you be at liberty to visit 
this capital of religion, much splendour will be re- 
flected by your presence on this solemnity; you will 
accumulate the most abundant riches of the divine 
mercy, and on your return will delightfully share 
the same, as most valuable treasures, amongst your 
people. 

Nor can we doubt but that all our dearest chil- 
dren in Christ, the Catholic princes, will assist us 
on this great occasion with theu' powerful concur- 
rence; that these our views, so beneficial to souls, 
may have the desired effect, For this purpose, we 
entreat and exhort them, by their commendable 
zeal for religion, to second the ardour of our vene- 
rable Episcopal brethren, to co-operate diligently 



g99 

with their exertions, and to provide safe conduct 
and protection, and houses of hospitable reception, 
along the roads throughout their several domin- 
ions, that they may not be exposed to any injury ia 
the performance of this most pious work. They 
must be fully aware what a general conspiracy was 
formed to root up the most sacred rights of the 
altar and the throne, and what wonders the Lord 
has wrought, who, stretching forth his hand, has 
humbled the arrogance of the strong. Let them 
reflect, that constant and suitable thanks ought to 
be rendered to the Lord of lords, to whom we are 
indebted for the victory; that the succour of the 
divine mercy is to be obtained by humble and fre- 
quent prayer; and that, as the wickedness of the 
impious is still creeping like a cancer, He may ac- 
cojHplish, in his clemency towards us, that work 
which he himself has begun. This, truly, we had 
chiefly in view, when we deliberated on the cele- 
bration of the Jubilee; well persuaded of the impor- 
tance of such a sacrifice of praise to the Lord, in 
this common consent of all Christian people, for 
obtaining those heavenly gifts, all the treasures of 
which we now throw open. Let, therefore, the Ca- 
tholic princes, labour for this purpose; and as they 
are endowed with great and generous minds, let 
them protect this most sacred work with earnest 
zeal and perpetual care. Assuredly they will learn, 
by experience, that by this means particularly they 
will secure to themselves the mercies of God; and 
that they certainly add to the support of their own 
government by whatever they do for the protection 



360 

of religion and the encouragement of piety; so that 
having destroyed every seed of vice, a delightful 
crop of virtues may succeed. 

But in order that all may prosper to our wishes, 
we entreat your prayers v^ith God, dear children, 
\vho are of the fold of Christ; for we confide in your 
common vows and supplications; which you put 
forth to the divine mercy, for the welfare oi the Ca- 
tholic religion, and for the return of those that err 
to the truth, and for the happiness of princes; and 
that you will hereby powerfully assist our infirmity 
in supporting our most weighty functions. 

And that these presents may more easily come to 
the knowledge of all the faithful in every place, we 
will, that precisely the same credit be paid even to 
printed copies, signed nevertheless by the hand of 
some public notary, and certified by the seal of a 
person invested with ecclesiastical dignity, as would 
be paid to these presents, if they should be produc- 
ed or shown. 

Be it, therefore, utterly unlawful for any man to 
infringe, or by any rash attempt to gainsay, this 
page of our ordinance, promulgation, grant, exhor- 
tation, dgnand, and will. But if any one shall pre- 
sume to attempt it, let him know, that he shall in- 
cur the indignation of Almighty God, and of his 
blessed apostles Peter and Paul. 

Given at Rome, at St. Peter's, in the year of 
our Lord's Incarnation, 1824, on the 24th 
May, in the first year of our Pontificate. 
j1, G. Cardinal^ Pro-JDatary. 
J, Cardinal Albani, 



X 



APPENDIX. 



Extracts from the Devotion and office of the 
Sacred Heart of our Lord Jesus Christ; with its 
J^Tature^ Oi'igin^ Progress^ Sec. Sec. including the 
Devotion to the Sacred Heart of the B. V. Mary, 
&;c. Sec. Sec, and the Reconnmendatory Pastoral 
Letter of the Bp. of Boulogne to the Faithful in his 
Diocess. Twelfth Edition: with an Appendix, on 
the Devotion of the S. H. of Jesus; — Prayers for 
the Exercise of that Devotion; and the Indult of 
his Holiness P. Pius VH. in favour of it: for the 
Use of the Midland District. London, by Keating 
and Brown, 1821.* 



"What is the corporeal and sensible object of 
this devotion? It is the material heart of the Son 
of God, who was made man out of his pure love 
for us; it is the most noble part of his adorable bo- 
dy; it is the principal organ of all the affections, 
and consequently of all the virtues of his blessed 

• As it is impossible to give an adequate idea of the con- 
tents of this book without making extracts that would ex- 
ceed all reasonable limits, I strongly recommend the peru- 
sal of it to those who wish to form a correct opinion of the 
ttue character of Roman Catholic devotion, 

X 



303 

humanity; it is the seat and centre wherein corfio* 
really dwells all the filenitude of his divinity^ and 
which becoming by virtue of the hypostatical union 
the heart of the King of kings, of the Holy of holies, 
of the God of majesty, is raised to an infinite digni- 
ty, which makes it worthy of our profound homage 
and adoration." — Pages 10, 11. 



"In a small town called Paroy le Monial, in the 
province of Burgundy, and diocess of Autun, there 
is a convent of the Visitation of the blessed Virgin 
Mary. Here a holy nun named Mary Margaret 
was consecrated to Jesus Christ at the age of twen- 
ty, and lived in retirement unknown. She died 
there in the odour of sanctity, aged forty, on the 
17th of October, 1690. Her virtues are attested 
by her superiors, and we learn by a writing she 
gave in obedience to her director, how eminently 
she was favoured by Almighty God. 

"This holy virgin was chosen by Jesus Christ to 
give a beginning to the devotion to his sacred heart. 
To dispose her to accomplish his design, he infus- 
ed into her a perfect knowledge of the excellence, 
the perfections, and the sufferings of this heart. — 
This gave her an ardent desire to see it known, 
honoured, and glorified by all creatures. When 
she was thus prepared, Jesus Christ one day ap- 
peared to her, and declared his intention of estab- 
lishing a solemnity in honour of his sacred heart, 
adding that he chose her to be the instrument of 



303 

carrying it into execution. Happy to find that the 
devotion was to be established, she trembled ^t 
the thought of being employed in it. Her youth, 
her natural diffidence, and her retirement from 
creatures, made her conclude that the execution of 
the design must in her hands be impossible. Un- 
der this impression she studiously concealed the 
revelation. But God still urging her to obey, she 
at length conceived that she could no longer re- 
sist without guilt. Father Claude la Colombiere, 
of the Society of Jesus, coming providentially to 
Paroy, she determined to open herself fully to him* 
This holy man, whose eminent sanctity and excel- 
lent writings still preserve his memory fresh in the 
minds of the faithful, full of the spirit of God, not 
content with hearing from her mouth all that had 
passed as above mentioned, obliged her moreover 
TO deliver in writing a circumstantial account of 
the revelation she had received and so long con- 
cealed, concerning this devotion to the sacred 
heart. We have in the foregoing chapter quoted 
and explained it. 

"He was too well acquainted with the eminent 
sanctity of his penitent to doubt her sincerity, and 
he considered the concluding injunction as an or- 
der of Jesus Christ, obliging him to use all his en- 
deavours to promote the design. But his absence 
from France, his infirmities, and the shortness of 
his remaining existence, prevented his making any 
considerable progress at the time. But we shall 
soon see that he was an instrument in the hands of 
Providence even after his death." — Page 58, 61. 



304 

"In 1720, when Provence was afflicted with the 
plague, and saw its most flourishing cities fall a 
prey to the scourge; when a general consternation 
pervaded the whole kingdom, God inspiring the 
suffering victims with a hope of safety from a de- 
vout address to his sacred heart, they had recourse 
to it to appease the vengeance of offended Heaven. 
One town followed another in adopting the means 
of delivery. Bishops and magistrates consecrated 
their respective people to the sacred heart, and en- 
gaged themselves by oath to celebrate the feast an- 
nually to the end of time. It may be said with 
truth, that God employed this visitation as a means 
to promote the glory of his sacred heart, which was 
the fruit of it. Happy they who wait not for the 
scourge, but apply to this amiable heart in order to 
prevent the punishment which their sins have de- 
served!'* — Pages 64, 65. 



"Objection.-— If the church approves a feast in 
honour of the divine heart of Jesus Christ, why not 
approve of other feasts to honour every part of his 
sacred body? Why a particular feast in honour of 
his divine heart? Moreover, the feasts are already 
so numerous in the church, that it seems improper 
to multiply them; new offices interrupt those which 
the church has formerly instituted. 

"As this objection has made great impression on 
many who have taken no pains to examine it, I have 
thought it necessary to mention it in a separate 
article, and to show the weakness of it. 



305 

"The numerous confraternities who celebrate the 
feast of the Sacred Heart with great solemnity, the 
number of bishops w^ho have approved them, the 
number of briefs of indulgences granted to them by 
the holy see, are a great proof that the above ob- 
jection has nothing solid. It is of little purpose to 
dispute whether the feast of the sacred heart de- 
serves to be approved. In a point of this nature, a 
great part of the church, authorized by so many 
bishops and the holy see, cannot mistake; for which 
reason, the objection \yhich opposes the institution 
of this feast can make no impression on a faithful, 
and devout soul." — Pages 115, 116. 



LETTERS PATENT OF AGGREGATION^. 

We, Brother Francis of S. Reginald, Prior of the 
venerable Arch-confraternity of the sacred heart 
of Jesus at RoxME, 
To our beloved in Christy the associates in the sacred 
heart of Jesus^ the faithful of either sex^ who are 
any ways British subjects^ or descended from them^ 
wheresoever they dwell; greeting in our Lord. 
Whereas his holiness of pious memory, Clement 
the XII. has by sundry decrees, viz. by one of the 
7th of March, 1732, another of the 28th of February, 
ditto, and a third of the 12th of June, 1736, granted 
many favours and privileges to our arch-confrater- 
nity of the sacred heart; and among the rest has em- 
powered it to unite and associate to itself any par- 
ticular confraternity of the sacred heart, extant any 
Y 2 



306 

where out of Rome, and to impart to it all and every 
indulgence, grant, or release of the canonical pen- 
ance due to sins, that has at any time been hereto- 
fore granted to this our arch-confraternity by his 
said holiness. 

And whereas a confraternity of the sacred heart, 
erected in the church or domestic chapel of the 
English fathers of the society of Jesus at Bruges, has 
applied to us, through its solicitor in Rome, Signor 
Joseph Monionelli, in order to obtain leave to be 
thus associated to ours, and to share in all its pri- 
vileges and grants: we have thought fit, considering 
the many good works of piety, penance and charity 
performed in that confraternity at Bruges, (which 
as to all essentials is modelled upon the same plan 
as ours) to unite and associate to it our arch-confra- 
ternity, pursuant to the power given us for this pur- 
pose by the holy see; and we grant to it and its mem- 
bers all the indulgences and particular favours men- 
tioned in the Popes' briefs; still keeping within the 
terms of the decree of Clement VIII. which directs 
such associations and communications of spiritual 
treasures. 

Moreover, besides the indulgence and special fa- 
vours set down in the above-mentioned papal grant, 
we impart to the said confraternity a share in all 
the masses, prayers, mortifications, pilgrimages, and 
other good works performed throughout the whole 
world by the several religious orders of Benedictins, 
Bernardins, Dominicans, Franciscans, Carmelites, 
Theatins, and Fathers of the Society of Jesus, pur- 
suant to the power we have received thereunto from 



307 

the superiors of the said orders; as may be seen ii> 
the authentic deeds belonging to our arch-confrater« 
nity, and lodged in our archives. 

For the proof whereof we have caused the pre- 
sent deed> signed by our own hand, to be underwrit- 
ten and published by the secretary of our arch-con- 
fraternity, and to be sealed with the seal thereof. 

Given at Rome, in the usual place of our congre^ 
gation, the 30th of January 1767, in the 9th year of 
his present holiness Clement the Xlllth's pontifi- 
cate, formerly our fellow associate, and now our 
most liberal father and protector. 

JBr. Francis of St. Reginald^ Prior. 

Br, Philip, of St. Joseph of Callassantio^ Secretary, 
Registered, book the first, page 63, No. 38. 

THE APPROBATION OF THE BISHOP OF BRUGES. 

We permit the publishing of these letters of ag- 
gregation, still with due regard to be paid to the de- 
cree of Clement the VIII. Qusecumque a sedc Ap,oa^ 
^o/ica, and we approve of the choice made by the as- 
sociates, of the Friday after the Octave of Corpus 
Christie for the principal feast of the association, in 
order to gain the plenary indulgence, and of the first 
Sunday in Advent, the second Sunday after the 
Epiphany, the third after Easter, and the first Sun- 
day of October, to gain the indulgence of seven 
years, and of so many quarantines, or forty days. 
Given at Bruges, in our episcopal Palace, the 
20th of March 1767. 

By the order of his lordship the bishop of Bruges. 
C, Beerenbrocky Secretary. 



308 

A petition that British Subjects might fiartake of the 
advantages of this institution,^ though remote from 
and unable to attend in the chafiels afifiointcd for the 
Association, 

Holy Father, 
The president, and the members of the confrater* 
nity of the most holy heart of Jesus, instituted for 
the subjects of Great Britain, of both sexes, in the 
chapel of the English seminary at Bruges, in Flan- 
ders, and associated to the arch-confraternity of the 
same title erected in the church of St. Theodore, 
at Rome, prostrate themselves at your Holiness's 
feet, and dutifully represent the signal advantages 
arising from the said confraternity in the increase 
of spiritual fervour among the faithful, and desirous 
to transmit these religious fruits to the latest pos- 
terity, humbly supplicate your Holiness to grant, 
that the members of the said confraternity of both 
sexes, who are not at liberty to visit the aforesaid 
chapel on the days appointed for obtaining the in- 
dulgences granted to the confraternity, may obtain 
all and every one of them, as if they had personally 
attended, provided they perform all the other good 
works prescribed for obtaining the said indulgen- 
ces. 



THE GRANT. 

At the audience of his Holiness^ Feb, 23(/, 1768. 
Our Holy Father Pope Clement XHI. is gracious- 
ly pleased to grant the prayer of the petition, and 



809 

enacts^ that such members of the confraternity as 
have it not in their power to visit the aforesaid 
chapel on the days appointed for obtaining the in- 
dulgences granted to the same, may have the benefit 
of all and every one of them, provided they perform 
all the other religious duties prescribed on that oc- 
casion; and his Holiness was pleased to order, that 
this his concession should be at all times considered 
as valid without the expedition of a brief. 

Dated^ Ro?ne^ from the office of the Secretary of 
the holy Congregation of Indulgences, 

Cardinal Calani, 
Prefect, 
Borgia, Secretary of the sacred Congregation of hi- 
dulgences, — Page 188 — 195. 



THE devotion TO THE SACRED HEART OF MARY, , 
SECTION I. 

As the adorable heart of Jesus was formed in the 
chaste womb of the blessed Virgin, and of her blood 
and substance, so we cannot in a more proper and 
agreeable manner show our devotion to the sacred 
heart of the Son, than by dedicating, some part of 
the said devotion to the ever pure heart of the 
Mother. For you have two hearts here united 
in the most strict alliance and tender conformity of 
sentiments, so that it is not in nature to please the 
one without making yourself agreeable to the other 



310 

and acceptable to both. Go then, devout client, go 
to the heart of Jesus, but let your way be through 
the heart of Mary. The sword of grief which 
pierced her soul, opens you a passage: enter by the 
wound love has made; advance to the heart of Jesus, 
and rest there even to death itself. Presume not to 
separate and divide two objects so intimately one, 
or united together, but ask redress in all your exi- 
gencies from the heart of Jesus, and ask this redress 
through the heart of Mary. 

This form and method of worship is the doctrine 
and the very spirit of God's church: it is what she 
teaches us in the unanimous voice and practice of 
the faithful, who will by no means that Jesus and 
Mary should be separated from each other in our 
prayers, praises, and affections. This considera- 
tion has engaged the sovereign pontiffs and head 
p«,ators 01 the church to give iheself-same sanction 
to the pious practices instituted in honour of the 
sacred heart of Mary, as they give to those of the 
adorable heart of Jesus, both within their proper 
limits. They both have equally their feasts and 
solemnities, both their associations, and those too 
equally enriched with the treasures of the church, 
under the liberal dispensation of its governors. 
Many are the pious and virtuous souls who have 
drawn most signal fruit and advantages from these 
devotions. — Page 198 — 200. 



311 

A NOYENA, OR NINE DAYS* DEVOTION TO THE EVER 
BLESSED VIRGIN. 

Having, out of devotion, lighted up a wax candle, 
either in your private oratory or in the church, re- 
cite each day the following prayer. The intent is 
for the obtaining some particular favour. 

"Incomparable Virgin! chosen by the ever ador- 
able Trinity, from all eternity, to be the most pure 
mother of Jesus, allow thy servant to remind thee of 
that ineffable joy thou receivedst in the instant of 
the most sacred incarnation of our divine Lord, and 
during the nine months thou carriedst him in thy 
most chaste bowels. O! that I could but renew, or 
if possible increase this thy joy by the fervor of my 
prayers; at least, most tender Mother of the afflict- 
ed! grant me, under the present pressure, those ma- 
ternal consolations and that peculiar protection, 
thou hast promised to such as shall devoutly com- 
memorate this ineffable joy. Relying on thy sacred 
word, and trusting in thy promises, I humbly en- 
treat thee to obtain from Jesus Christ, thy dearly 
beloved Son, my request." 

Having specified it^ say^ 

"May this light I burn before thy image, stand 
as a memorial of the lively confidence I repose in 
thy bounty. May it consume in honour of that in- 
flamed and supernatural love and joy with which 
thy sacred heart was replenished during the abode 
of thy blessed Son in thy womb: in veneration of 
which I offer to thee the sentiments of my heart, 
ancl the following salutations/* 



SIS 

Say nine Hail Marys^ and then the following Prayers. 
"Mother of my God most merciful ! to thee I of- 
fer these Hail Marys: they are so many brilliant 
jewels in the diadem of thy accidental glory, which 
will remain increasing to the end of the world. I 
beseech thee, Comforter of the afflicted! by the joy 
thou receivedst in the nine months of thy pregnan- 
cy, to comfort my afflicted heart, and to obtain for 
me, from thy Son, a favourable answer to the peti- 
tion I make to thy compassionate mercy and bene- 
volence. To this effect I offer to thee all the good 
works that have ever been performed in the confra- 
ternities of thy sacred heart, and other associations 
in thy honour. I most humbly entreat thee, on this 
consideration, and for the love of the sacred heart 
of Jesus, with which thy own was ever so inflamed, 
to hear my humble suit and grant my request. 
Jmen," — Page 208—211. 



Jin Exam file. 

"A nobleman, who for sixty years of his life past 
had never had access to the sacraments, and who 
had given loose to the passions of his body and 
mind, and abandoned himself to the slavery of his 
spiritual enemy, fell sick, and was in the utmost 
danger of death. Hopes of salvation he had none, 
and so desperate was his case, that he would not 
give ear to the salutary advice of his director, or 
admit into his mind the thoughts of reconciling 



313 

himself to his Creator, by means of the sacrament 
of penance. Nevertheless, in the midst of the ex- 
cesses of so profligate a life, he had never entirely 
lost sight of some small devotion and regard to the 
ever blessed Mother of God. Jesus Christ, who 
manifests the riches of his mercy particularly to 
such as cast a favourable eye towards her, raised in 
him so great a compunction for his sins, that, enter- 
ing into himself, and in the utmost contrition of his 
heart, he three several times in the same day made 
a general confession of his whole life, received the 
holy eucharist, and the sixth day after died in all 
peace and quiet of mind, and with the sentiments 
of joy which flow from a well-grounded confidence 
in the mercies and bounty of our sufl*ering Redeem- 
er and his sacred passion. In effect, our blessed 
Saviour revealed, soon after his death, to the holy 
St. Bridget, that the said penitent died in a state of 
grace, was a blessed soul, and owed his happiness 
in great measure to the tender, affectionate compas- 
sion which he had ever found and nourished in his 
heart, so often as he heard others speak of the sa- 
cred dolours of our blessed Lady, or happened to 
entertain the memory of them in his mind." — Page 
234—236. 



Jn Angelical Exercise in Honour of our Blessed Lady . 
Whosoever is devoted to this exercise in honour 
of the blessed Virgin Mary, in reading over every 
Z 



314 

point, may meditate upon it for the space of one 
Hail Mary or more, and by God's grace, he will in 
a short time find himself greatly increase in love to- 
wards that blessed Queen of Heaven; and at the hour 
of death will, by so pious a mother, be received as 
her dearest child. Nor can such a one, according 
to St. Anselm and St. Bernard, possibly perish, but 
shall find life everlasting, and taste of the joys of 
eternal bliss.* — Page 275, 276. 



Of Agnus Dei^s, 
All Agnu8 Dei (so called from the image of the 
Lamb of God impressed on the face of it) is made 
of virgin wax, balsam, and chrism, blessed accord- 
ing to the form prescribed in the Roman ritual. 

* A specimen of this ^^ngelical Exercise will be found in 
Letter VI. It is a kind of dialogue between the Virgin and 
her worshipper; the language used by the former is often 
ludicrous, and now and then any thing but delicate. She 
always illustrates her advice by the example of saints; and in 
one instance recommends the caution of St. Aloysius Gonza- 
ga, who "would not even speak alone with his own mother, 
for fear of the least danger of offence.'* "I assure you,'' says 
the Virgin, on another occasion, "Ii\ the sincerity of a mother, 
that it were better to sleep among serpents, dragons, basi- 
lisks, and even the very devils themselves, than to rest one 
night in mortal sin." Again, "My blessed servant Ignatius 
gave me one day power over his heart, and I did render it sa 
chaste and strong, that he never after felt any motion of the 
flesh all his life." 



315 

The spiritual efficacy, or virtue of it, is gathered 
from the prayers that the church makes use of in 
the blessing of it, which is to preserve him who 
carries an Agnus Dei, or any particle of it, about 
him, from any attempts of his spiritual or temporal 
enemies; from the dangers of fire, of water, of storms 
and tempests, of thunder and lightning, and from a 
sudden and unprovided death. It puts the devils to 
flight, succours women in childbed, takes away the 
stains of past sins, and furnishes us with new grace 
for the future, that we may be preserved from all 
adversities and perils, both in life and death, through 
the cross and merits of the Lamb, who redeemed 
and washed us in his blood. 

The Pope consecrates the Agnus Dei's the first 
year of his pontificate, and afterwards every seventh 
year on Saturday before Low-Sunday, with many 
solemn ceremonies and devout prayers. Franc, 
Cost, Lib. 4. Christian Institut. cap, 12. 

The use of the Agnus Dei is so ancient, that it is 
now above 960 years since Pope Leo, the third of 
that name, made a present of one to the emperor 
Charles the Great, who received it from the hands 
of his Holiness, as a treasure sent him from heaven^ 
and reverenced it with a singular piety and devotion^, 
as it is recounted in the book intituled, Registr. 
Sum. Pontif.-^PsL^e 375—377. 



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